IIn Frankfurt’s Bahnhofsviertel, a 42-year-old man attacked several people with a knife on Tuesday morning, three of whom were seriously injured. The background to the act initially remained unclear. There are now more detailed information about the course of the act.
As a result, at 9:00 a.m., witnesses saw the man initially assault a 40-year-old man who was camped on the sidewalk. He kicked and hit him. When the man lying on the ground woke up and got up, the forty-two-year-old is said to have tried to attack him with the knife, according to the police. The victim could do the first Still fend off the attack, but was then seriously injured. Subsequently, the perpetrator is said to have let go of the forty-year-old and attacked three other people with the knife. The victims were men aged 24, 40 and 78. The twenty-four year old and the seventy eight year old were seriously injured. The suspect also suffered injuries that required treatment.
Seemingly random
The police cordoned off the area around the corner of Karlstrasse and Niddastrasse until the early afternoon. When he was arrested, the attacker still had the knife in his hand.
It is currently unclear whether the perpetrator knew the victims. Witnesses had previously reported that it appeared that he had chosen the injured at random. They were immediately taken to nearby hospitals.
According to witnesses, the man is also alleged to have acted under the influence of drugs. According to the police, this is also currently being clarified. A political motive will also be examined, said a spokesman.
Where did the attacks take place?
There are several alleged crime scenes, namely the corner of Karlstrasse and Niddastrasse and the corner of Moselstrasse. However, it is unclear whether the attacks actually took place there or whether the injured victims “dragged themselves there” to get to safety, as a spokesman said. Forensics is currently still in use.
The 96-year-old Esther Bejarano – here on the 10th day of remembrance of the soccer network “Never Again” – survived the Auschwitz concentration camp as a member of the girls’ orchestra.
Photo: imago images / Hartenfelser
For a long time, sports clubs did not want to admit their involvement in National Socialism. But in the meantime a lively memory work has developed especially around football. Fans visit memorial sites, clubs establish partnerships with museums, and social workers organize workshops. “We should include the stadiums even more in the future,” says Berlin historian Juliane Röleke, who has long been concerned with memory work in football. What could fans watch in the Third Reich? Were their stadiums close to labor camps or concentration camp outposts? Were sports facilities used for SS propaganda games or as assembly points for deportations? There are still inadequate answers to many of these questions.
The soccer network “Never Again” has shaped educational work in soccer for 17 years. This year, too, events around the International Holocaust Remembrance Day will take place on January 27th, mostly digitally. But there are still gaps in research, believes Röleke, who studied the history of Hertha BSC in the Third Reich with Berlin fans. How do Bundesliga sponsors deal with their role in National Socialism in their corporate history? “It’s almost good form to deal with National Socialism, but it happens in a relatively uncritical way,” says Röleke. “It would also be important to look at the time after 1945. Who exactly rebuilt the clubs? «The prohibition of women’s football in 1955 was largely enforced by DFB officials who had once been in the NSDAP.
In recent years fans and historians have created a public space for persecuted Jewish athletes and officials, for Julius Hirsch, Gottfried Fuchs and Kurt Landauer. Prominent perpetrators in the clubs received less attention. One exception: Otto Harder, one of the most important players in Hamburger SV in the 1920s. Harder became a member of the NSDAP in 1932 and joined the SS in 1933, later he worked as a security guard in several concentration camps. “Harder was still honored and viewed as a role model after 1945,” says political scientist Paula Scholz, who had worked on an exhibition at the Neuengamme Concentration Camp Memorial on football in Hamburg under National Socialism. Your research was sometimes difficult. “The big clubs usually have archives,” says Scholz, but the situation is different for smaller clubs or regional associations: “And if there are archives, in many places there are rooms in the basement that are not even public.”
Partnerships between clubs, fan projects, memorials and city archives have emerged at several Bundesliga locations. It is important to transfer knowledge about the past into the present. “Anti-Semitism manifests itself in a wide variety of ways,” says Pavel Brunßen, who has been researching forms of discrimination in football for years and is currently doing his doctorate at the University of Michigan. Brunßen has analyzed examples of anti-Semitism: hateful songs from fans on travel routes, the desecration of a Jewish cemetery or attacks on Maccabi, “as a lightning rod for anger over the Israel-Palestine conflict, where a Jewish association is held liable.”
Antigypsyism and hostility to Sinti and Roma are less problematic. In many places, fans, professional players and youth footballers use the word “gypsies” as an insult to differentiate themselves, says Brunßen: “The term is historically charged and conveys stereotypes. And when people talk about it in public, they always say: it is not meant that way, and it’s not a problem at all. «Numerous groups and activists who campaign against right-wing extremism are attacked by neo-Nazis. Pavel Brunßen therefore wants a “central anti-discrimination agency that can work long-term and is not tied to anyone.” An institution that networks local knowledge.
What could be new stages in memory work? The Berlin association »Parlor Games«, which organizes events on football, politics and culture, cultivates international exchange. For example in 2018: At that time, 21 fans from Germany and Ukraine traveled to Kiev. They also visited the Babyn Yar Gorge, where the Nazis murdered more than 33,000 Jews in two days in 1941. The German fans noticed in discussions that they could not easily transfer their political coordinate system to Ukraine. “It may be that international partners have a different view of LGBTIQ or colonial history than we do,” says Rico Noack from “Parlor Games”. “At the same time, we shouldn’t apply the Central European compass of values to the partner organizations.” A process of weighing up.
This year, the “Never Again” alliance particularly reminds people who have been and are excluded because of their sexual and gender identity. “Sport is part of the reality of life for many people,” says the political scientist Nina Reip, who heads the office of the “Sport and Politics” network. “There are good points of contact in sport that young people can use to establish an emotional connection to what happened back then.” Reip took part in a digital tour of the concentration camp memorial in Dachau near Munich. In a time in which fewer and fewer contemporary witnesses can report, formats like these will increasingly shape the culture of commemoration.
Nazi murderers are rewarded to this day, while the victims of German crimes often wait in vain for compensation to this day
For decades, former members of the SS have been rewarded in the Federal Republic with generous contributions from the state treasury. The Social Committee of the Bundestag had to deal with this practice on Monday under pressure from the parliamentary group of Die Linke. In an application, she demands that payments be stopped at least for the SS volunteers.
In doing so, she takes up a resolution of the Belgian parliament that was supported by MPs from almost all parties almost two years ago (see jW from February 27, 2019). Because from the benefits that are granted under the Federal Supply Act (BVG), foreigners who had joined the Wehrmacht, Waffen-SS or police associations at the time also benefit. The Belgian parliamentarians stated that “the receipt of pensions for collaboration with one of the most murderous regimes in history contradicts the work of remembrance and the peace project of European unification.” They are calling on the federal government to “stop paying pension payments to Belgian collaborators” and to approve the formation of an international commission of scientists. The German practice is also criticized in other countries, in France there is talk of the “money of shame”.
According to the federal government in response to a request from the left-wing parliamentary group at the end of December, around 45,000 people are still receiving benefits as compensation for damage to health caused by the war or imprisonment. This also includes civilians, such as bomb victims. The number of former SS members is not shown separately. All that is known is that of the ten recipients in Belgium one belonged to the Waffen SS, in France there are two. The average amount of the benefits is 502 euros per month for beneficiaries in Germany, 342 euros per month abroad. For comparison: Former forced laborers were fobbed off with one-off payments of a maximum of 7,500 euros, for persecuted Roma in Eastern Europe there was a maximum of 2,500 euros – one-off. Anyone who has health problems due to persecution by the Nazis today can at best appear as a petitioner in order to benefit from humanitarian programs from Germany – for a limited time and without legal entitlement.
This is not a problem for the federal government. In response to inquiries, she referred to the introduction of an “unworthiness clause” in the law, which after 1998 ensured that beneficiaries were excluded from services in the event of proven “violations of principles of humanity”. On closer inspection, however, it is only a beautiful appearance: In the hearing, the expert Stefan Klemp pointed out that of the almost one million beneficiaries at the time, only 99 had been screened out. Experts had expected a number between 10,000 and 50,000.
In a research report for the Federal Ministry of Labor, Klemp described the failure of the “unworthiness clause” to a large extent four years ago. There was a lack of digitization of files and the authorities involved were hopelessly overwhelmed. In practice, employees of the supply authorities were required to have specialist historical knowledge that they did not have. Social courts also interpreted the legal provisions very differently.
Many authorities only focused on whether the victims had been convicted of Nazi crimes – how lenient the West German judiciary was in this regard is well known. Klemp assumes that instead of 99, at least 7,500 offenders should have been excluded. As a result, even concentration camp guards and members of police battalions who were involved in murders against civilians continued to receive benefits. On Monday, Klemp described the case of SS Rottenführer Willi H. in the Bundestag as an example, who had served in the Majdanek concentration camp, among other places. After the war he was in Polish police custody – in the FRG this was counted as a prisoner of war. A preliminary investigation against him was closed in 2000. His functions in various concentration camps did not justify exclusion from war victims, it was concluded.
After the Federal Court of Justice in 2008 in the proceedings against the concentration camp overseer John Demjanjuk marked the assumption of security duty in the concentration camp as aiding and abetting murder, a further review of the recipients of BVG payments would have been possible – it failed due to the political will of the authorities. While in the hearing on Monday it was disputed to what extent a blanket exclusion of benefits for all SS volunteers would be legally possible – in view of the low numbers, more of a symbolic demand – the call for scientific analysis was supported by all experts. Both the practice of granting benefits and the “unworthiness clause” should be examined. Some of the files required for this have already been destroyed – which made Klemp all the more urgent to secure the remaining files.
Whe has a warm stove, is sure to have an advantage on these cold days. I myself heat with natural gas, for the sake of the environment and the health of my neighborhood. And I’m probably the only one who doesn’t have a wood stove in my residential area in the south of Freiburg. By sunset at the latest, the whole neighborhood smells like a fireplace. Warm inside, fine dust alarm outside.
Andreas Frey
Freelance writer in the science of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung.
I recently saw a neighbor who was throwing ashes, presumably from his wood-burning stove, in the garden. In the heart of the eco-city you shouldn’t really be surprised about such things anymore, there are people here who put their garden hose in the sun in summer to take a climate-neutral shower. But then I was wondering: Can something useful be done with wood ash in the garden? To get straight to the point: the experts do not quite agree.
On the one hand, ash is possibly the oldest fertilizer in the world. Entire ecosystems are dependent on what fires leave behind: “Fire fertilizes and rejuvenates the soil,” said the great fire ecologist Stephen Pyne a year ago to “Spiegel”. Today fertilizers and pesticides take over this service, fire has been pushed out of our world. With it the ashes too. That is actually a shame, because ash has several advantages: a very high pH value, which makes it particularly suitable for heavy, clayey soils. In addition, it is a free mineral fertilizer with a lot of calcium, phosphorus and potassium, which are easily soluble and therefore readily available. This lime fertilization in the garden should only be carried out in harvested beds, because ashes could burn sensitive plant tissue.
Problematic coal ash
For plants such as rhododendrons, daffodils or peonies, ashes are again unsuitable, because they need an acidic environment; Potatoes, onions, tomatoes, grapevines and roses, on the other hand, benefit. This fertilization would also benefit peat peat, such as that applied in flower pots or raised beds. The application of quicklime is usually not even necessary because calcium is often found in the soil. Garden experts therefore warn against over-fertilization, more than thirty grams of ash per square meter should never be applied anyway. Ash is helpful in the fight against annoying root weeds such as dandelions or thistles – and also against pests such as fleas and aphids. It can also be used to scare away unwanted moss.
Despite such advantages, some gardening experts have reservations about using ash fertilization at all because of the heavy metals. Coal ash, which is often contaminated with lead and chromium, is particularly problematic. But wood ash can also contain heavy metals, even if you are not one of those stove owners who let furniture or even shoes go up in flames. Even the ashes of supposedly untreated logs can be contaminated; poplar, alder and birch are the most suitable: these trees absorb the least.
Anyone who wants to protect their own potatoes from possible heavy metal residues can still use their ashes sensibly. Instead of scattering large areas of salt in winter, wood ash is also used against slippery snow surfaces. Ash instead of salt, that ultimately helps all plants. My neighbors have probably already known that.
After the Kremlin announced, Russia and the USA reached an agreement to extend the New Start nuclear disarmament treaty. Corresponding diplomatic notes were exchanged on Tuesday, the Kremlin announced in the evening after President Vladimir Putin made a phone call with his US colleague Joe Biden. Both sides had previously declared their willingness to extend the last disarmament agreement, which expired at the beginning of February, by five years.
The Russian parliament is now waiting for the relevant documents and will begin the ratification process immediately, said the head of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Duma, Leonid Slutsky. The Duma is ready to start work at any moment.
The New Start Treaty on the Limitation of Nuclear Weapons would have expired in a few days. The agreement, which came into force on February 5, 2011, limits the nuclear arsenals of Russia and the United States to 800 delivery systems and 1,550 operational nuclear warheads each. It was closed for a period of ten years and had the option of being extended.
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If it had not been extended, there would have been no agreement for the first time in decades that set limits on the number of strategic nuclear weapons. Russia and the USA together own around 90 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons.
According to the USA, the extension is for defense
The government of Biden’s predecessor, Donald Trump, had not been able to agree on an extension with Moscow in tough months of negotiations. Immediately after Biden’s swearing-in, the Russian Foreign Ministry proposed on Wednesday last week that the contract be extended by five years without any preconditions. Shortly afterwards it was announced that Biden was also ready for such an extension.
Before taking office, Biden had declared that the treaty was an “anchor of strategic stability” between the US and Russia and could be the basis for new arms control agreements.
The Pentagon stressed last week that an extension would serve the defense of the United States. The Americans would then be much safer. One cannot afford to lose the instruments for inspections and reporting obligations. An extension to 2026 would also give both sides enough time to explore new arms control agreements
Russia had spoken out early in favor of an extension of the current treaty and warned of an arms race if it failed. Russia is ready for cooperation on the basis of the principles of equality and mutual consideration of interests, it said last Wednesday.
There was a risk of war under Trump
The Trump administration had insisted, according to US media, that the “freezing” of the number of all nuclear warheads in both countries be included in the treaty. The original version only defines the limit on the number of operational nuclear warheads. In addition, the previous US government had sought a multilateral agreement with China’s participation. Beijing has so far refused to negotiate its growing nuclear arsenal.
The danger of a war that was also waged with nuclear weapons was considered to be significantly higher during Trump’s term of office than in the past three decades. One of the reasons for this was the end of the INF treaty to renounce land-based medium-range nuclear weapon systems.
The US had dissolved the agreement in the summer of 2019 with the backing of its NATO partners because they assume that Russia has been violating it for years with a medium-range system called 9M729 (NATO code: SSC-8). The INF treaty prohibited both sides from producing, testing and owning ground-based ballistic missiles and cruise missiles with ranges between 500 and 5500 kilometers. (dpa)
The whole world is looking forward to the future vaccine against covid-19. Of the 200 studies underway, a dozen formulas are already in the final stretch of clinical trials. Rafael Vilasanjuan, member of the board of directors of the Global Alliance for Vaccination (GAVI) talks about the lights and shadows of this unparalleled scientific, economic and political career. “Next year there could be up to three and four vaccines, but the pandemic will not be over,” glimpses the also director of the ISGlobal Global Analysis and Development Department.
Lets start by the beginning. How is the race for the vaccine going? The race for the vaccine is already in a very advanced stage. We have quite a few candidates in phase three. Among these, there are between six and eight with very good prospects. Usually only 50% of vaccines at this stage go through. But now it can, and I say can, that this percentage is higher because the efforts that have been put into research have been extraordinary. Next year there may be as many as three to four vaccines available, but the pandemic is still not over. For that, we will have to wait for it to reach the whole world and for a good part of the population to be immunized.
These days there are many who look to the Pfizer and BioNTech vaccine with hope. How should we read the ad from the pharmaceutical company? Optimism or caution?
Both. Pfizer’s announcement is very good news because it is the first to come out on phase three efficacy results. But beware, we still don’t have the scientific results. Only the press release from the pharmacist.
If the results are so encouraging, why hasn’t the scientific data been waited for?
The clinical trial is ongoing. No solid results yet. The result may have been announced to convey to people that we are very close to having a vaccine. Or for market reasons. Or to assure producers. Vaccines like Pfizer’s or Moderna’s are based on RNA, a completely new technology. There are relatively few producers capable of making these types of formulas, and pharmaceutical companies are struggling to secure them.
“The Pfizer vaccine needs to be at 80 degrees below zero. In Spain they could only be distributed in hospitals”
I understand that there is a trade war part and a logistical war part …
Effectively. Pfizer’s vaccine needs to be minus 80 degrees. This implies a logistical challenge. In Spain, for example, they could only be distributed in hospitals. It is also a very big handicap for these vaccines to reach Africa, Latin America and Asia. For this reason, from the international platform ‘Covax facility’ we have not entered into negotiations with any vaccine that needs an ultra-cold chain, because it would be inaccessible for low or middle income countries.
Pfizer talks of 50 million doses before the end of the year. Astrazeneca, Moderna, Janssen and Novavax of several million more. Countries also say they will have thousands of doses ready in a matter of months. Is production already underway?
Yes. Pharmaceutical companies have already started to produce. For now, in a ‘slowed down’ way. But as soon as they have the ‘ok’ of clinical trials and the health authorities will be able to turbo. This process is being carried out with the money that different actors have invested. Countries have made an investment at risk; they have paid in advance so that the vaccines could be developed quickly on the condition that if the trials go ahead they receive part of the doses and if they do not work that money is lost. That is why we see that countries are investing in various vaccines.
Much has been said about the arrival date of the first vaccine. What steps must be taken for this to finally happen?
We will have to wait until the end of the year for the first results of the clinical trials to arrive. And a few more weeks or months for independent bodies to evaluate the data. If the results are good, the vaccines would be granted emergency regulation; which would imply a limited approval for its use. If all goes well, this could come early next year.
“If the results are good, the vaccines would be granted an emergency regulation; which would imply a limited approval for their use”
With what scale do regulatory bodies work to approve these vaccines?
The requirements are two; safety and efficacy. Regulatory mechanisms are inflexible with security parameters. For this reason the tests have to stop as soon as an anomalous case is detected. In terms of efficacy, the World Health Organization has come to speak of an efficacy of around 50%. But this figure will depend on many factors. There will be more effective vaccines to cut transmission and others more effective to reduce severe symptoms. For this reason, some will be more suitable for some population groups than others.
What would it mean to approve a 50% efficacy vaccine?
In practice it would mean if you and I get vaccinated, one of us is not protected. This has different implications. As you have to continue with other types of measures until you manage to lower the infection rate. Or that you have to fight so that the vaccine reaches all countries. It makes no sense to immunize all of Spain and forget about the other countries if we want to keep the borders open.
What should be the criteria for the distribution of vaccines so that they effectively stop the global pandemic?
The effectiveness of vaccines will be stronger if they are distributed fairly throughout the world. Countries where the peak of the pandemic is worst should be prioritized. This is going to be difficult because there is already a nationalism of vaccines and each country is struggling to get its doses.
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“Countries where the peak of the pandemic is worst should be prioritized. This is going to be difficult because there is already a vaccine nationalism”
Are vaccines the definitive solution to the pandemic?The solution to the covid-19 pandemic goes through three steps. Have a vaccine soon. Make it cheap. And that it can be distributed all over the world. We still do not know at what price the different vaccines are being traded; we only know the advance payments that have been made. If the future vaccine is worth more than two or three dollars a dose, it would be inaccessible to much of the world’s population. Civil society would have to push to lower costs. Especially since a large part of the investment that has been made is public.
Leningrad should be starved. The bread had to be rationed in the first winter. There was just 125 grams per person per day. Traditionally, St. Petersburg celebrates the end of the blockade on January 27th.
A late afternoon in December 2020. Galina Pavlovna is sitting in front of the patterned wallpaper of her Petersburg apartment and looking expectantly at the screen of her laptop. It is not the first video conference that the pensioner has attended. But it does not happen every day that two young German journalists virtually exchange ideas with her about their experiences almost 80 years ago.
At the beginning of the conversation, the 83-year-old is still a little reserved, and it takes a while before she talks about her experiences in the sealed-off city. She is one of the few contemporary witnesses who can still tell from personal experience of the Leningrad blockade from 1941 to 1944. Although she was only four years old at the time, her memories of the encircled city are still alive today. The sounds of airplane engines and windows bursting are etched into her mind. During a bomb attack, she and her mother were buried in the basement of the apartment building. They could be rescued a little later, but only then did the real struggle for survival in a town sealed off by German soldiers begin for her and her mother.
The Wehrmacht invaded the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941. What Adolf Hitler initially stylized as a war of ideology under the catchphrase »Operation Barbarossa« was in reality a war of race-ideological extermination. In addition to the goal of conquering new living space in the east, his real concern was the extermination of Judaism. At the same time, the Slavic “subhumans” were to be decimated and subjected to the new settlers. The aim was to smash the Soviet power and advance to the Volga before winter.
The plan initially seemed to work. Just two months later, on September 1, 1941, Army Group North of the Wehrmacht conquered areas south of Leningrad, today’s St. Petersburg. Hitler’s original plan was to take the city. But since Army Group North would not have been able to organize an effective attack on Leningrad and Hitler did not want to supply the city in the coming winter, he gave the order on September 12th to enclose Leningrad. At that time, around 2.5 million people lived in the city. Hitler speculated that over time the city would give itself up. This gruesome plan was followed by 872 days of siege up to January 27, 1944. There are different estimates of how many people died during the blockade. Historians are currently assuming over a million victims, most of whom died of starvation.
The deadly winter of 1941/42
The hardest time for the Leningrad population was the first winter. The food stores were almost completely destroyed by bombing. German soldiers had completely cordoned off the city so that nothing and no one could come in or out of Leningrad. There was no electricity, no heating, no water. And the temperatures dropped to minus 42 degrees on some days. In their need, people began to burn furniture. “But the worst was the hunger,” says Galina Pavlovna. The population felt the need for supplies due to the drastically falling norms for food distribution.
In November 1941, the lowest ration of bread was introduced for the residents of the besieged city – 125 grams per day, half mixed with wood crumbs and other impurities. Everything edible in the city was collected, even leather belts and shoe soles were cooked. “I can remember sitting there and eating glue that I peeled off the spines of books and the wallpaper on the wall.” When Galina Pavlovna relates this, she pauses for a moment. The thoughts of what has been experienced are painful. When she recounts the horror of constant hunger, she chooses her words carefully. “Not even dogs, cats, and pigeons remained in Leningrad.” In time, death became their gloomy companion. “People took to the streets and just fell over. Their corpses weren’t even picked up by anyone, because the people had run out of strength. You couldn’t lie down and do nothing. Because if you lay down you never got up again, ”says Galina Pavlovna.
The road of life
At the end of November 1941, after two and a half months of siege, the Red Army finally succeeded in creating an ice road across the frozen Lake Ladoga in the north of Leningrad. Thanks to this connection to the Russian mainland, not only did essential goods slowly return to the city, the residents also took advantage of the way out and fled by the hundreds of thousands. The 36-kilometer escape and supply route is therefore called the “Road of Life”.
But not everyone in the besieged city had the opportunity to escape the city. Galina Pavlovna and her mother only fled at the end of February 1942, when both were already suffering from severe dystrophy due to hunger. They reached Lake Ladoga with great difficulty. Once there, the mother looked around for a free transport vehicle, the so-called Polutorka. Meanwhile, the little daughter had set her down on a pile of snow with her few belongings. Galina Pavlovna recalls how they got into the Polutorka in a hurry: “All our things were left in the snow, we couldn’t take anything with us. When we were driving across the ice road, a vehicle collapsed in the ice in front of us. It was terrible and there was bombing all the time. “
When mother and daughter finally reached the other bank of the lake, they still had a long way to go. They finally found refuge with relatives in Yaroslavl, 800 kilometers away. There the emaciated refugees were given a mixture of bread and water. “The hardest part was not to eat everything at once. Because the people who ate everything immediately got severe stomach cramps and died from it. As a child, I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t eat my fill right away. “
Return to Leningrad
In 1946, after the end of the war, mother and daughter returned to Leningrad. When asked why they came back to the destroyed city where they had suffered so much, Galina Pavlovna replies: »My mother and I were born in Leningrad, our roots were there. For us it was still the most beautiful city in the world. “
Although Galina Pavlovna was still a small child at the time of the blockade, she never let go of the experience. When she retired at the age of 55, she began volunteering on the City Council of Veterans. The organization helps blockade survivors, for example, with the enforcement of pension claims. But she also talked about her experiences in the war in the family environment with her children and grandchildren from the start. She has never hidden the painful memories of the blockade from her life.
Russians call the victims and survivors of the Leningrad blockade “Blokadniki”; they are held in high regard. Galina Pavlovna proudly holds her brass medal entitled “Inhabitant of besieged Leningrad” in the webcam. This award honors people who have lived in the besieged city for at least four months. The day of the lifting of the blockade on January 27, 1944 is one of the most important holidays in St. Petersburg. Every year there is a military parade in Palace Square, and cannon salutes are fired into the air on the Field of Mars in honor of the Red Army. The Soviet honorary designation “City of Heroes”, which St. Petersburg still bears today, testifies to a heroic culture of remembrance.
This year, however, due to the pandemic, the celebrations will only be held in short form or online. The gala concert in the St. Petersburg Oktyabrsky concert hall, which Galina Pavlovna was particularly looking forward to, will be broadcast on television. However, the ceremonies at the memorial cemeteries should continue to take place in compliance with hygiene standards. Individual remembrance of the suffering of the population takes place in St. Petersburg at many decentralized places of remembrance.
In Germany, the memory of the Leningrad blockade played only a subordinate role alongside theaters of war such as Stalingrad or Dresden. It was only two years ago that the German public became aware of the event again. On the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the lifting of the blockade, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas and his Russian colleague Sergei Lavrov announced a “humanitarian gesture”. Germany agreed to renovate a veterans hospital and also pledged more funds to keep the memory of the Leningrad blockade alive. This project is being implemented by the German Society for International Cooperation (GIZ) in cooperation with the German-Russian meeting center in St. Petersburg. The foundation organizes numerous educational and cultural offers as well as meetings with survivors of the blockade, in which Galina Pavlovna has already participated. The farewell to her at the end of the video conversation is warm. “A great deal has been written about the Leningrad blockade. Nevertheless, there is still so much to tell about it, ”she says.
When she invites the German journalists to partake in a guided tour, it becomes clear that with her work of remembrance she not only wants to bring the past to life, but also to build bridges between once warring nations.
After the game in Uerdingen was canceled, the third division soccer team FC Ingolstadt gave the all-clear for the home game against Halleschen FC this Wednesday (7 p.m.). As the Schanzer announced on Tuesday, the encounter can take place. According to the responsible laboratory, the positive corona findings from last weekend were “false positive or negative”. This resulted in another series of tests at the Ingolstadt-based company. The entire Uerdingen team had been sent to quarantine, and the FCI later also made positive findings public.
Falling infection numbers in Germany, mandatory PCR tests before traveling to France, more tests in childcare: an overview of the corona news.
Franziska Giffey calls for an expansion of corona tests in childcare Photo: Marijan Murat / dpa
Again fewer new infections and deaths
The downward trend in corona numbers in Germany continues. With 859 new corona deaths reported by the Robert Koch Institute on Friday, the total number of deceased rose to over 50,000. But the number of deaths reported daily is slowly decreasing: the 7-day mean is currently 4 percent lower than the day before and 9 percent lower than a week ago with 807 deaths per day.
The number of new infections reported continues to decline. 17,862 new cases lower the 7-day mean to 15,043. That is again 4 percent less than the day before and 21 percent less than a week ago. According to the Robert Koch Institute, the so-called 7-day incidence drops to 115. (mkr / taz)
EU could pass vaccine on to poorer countries
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The EU wants to support poorer countries with corona vaccinations and could also pass on its own vaccine. After the summit of heads of state and government on Thursday evening, EU Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen referred to the “global rush” on vaccination doses. A new mechanism would allow European countries to make cans available to partner countries. “In a few months we will have more cans in Europe than we can need,” said von der Leyen. However, the transfer of doses to partners outside the EU should not disrupt national vaccination campaigns within the EU.
According to von der Leyen, the substance could be made available via the international vaccination initiative Covax. So far, the EU has supported Covax financially, but not by passing on vaccines. Covax was set up to ensure fair access to vaccines around the world. However, many countries obtain vaccine from Covax. The EU countries also signed their contracts bilaterally with the pharmaceutical companies. In the past, observers have therefore blamed the EU for the vaccine shortage that Covax suffers from. (epd)
France now requires a PCR test before entry
France requires travelers from other EU countries to submit a negative Corona-PCR test from Sunday. This type of test must have been taken within 72 hours of departure, as the office of President Emmanuel Macron announced on Friday night. Macron informed his EU colleagues about the new rules at the video summit the evening before.
The obligation to the PCR test applies according to the information for all trips to France that are not “essential”. Exceptions apply to commuters who work in France but do not live there. Travelers from EU countries had to show a negative test for the coronavirus when entering France. However, it did not necessarily have to be a PCR test. During these tests, a smear is examined in the laboratory. For travelers from non-EU countries, France has been requiring a negative PCR test since last weekend. (afp)
Giffey wants more tests in childcare
Federal Family Minister Franziska Giffey (SPD) calls for an expansion of corona tests in childcare as well. “I think it is now very important, as long as vaccination is not yet possible, to expand the tests,” said Giffey, the Berlin SPD state chairman, in the ARD “Morgenmagazin” on Friday. Currently, there are mainly voluntary tests in childcare. According to the current Coronakita study, around 20 percent of educators are not on the child due to corona. “That’s a high number,” noted Giffey. They are sick or in quarantine.
“After February 14, we need an opening,” continued the Family Minister. “The longer it takes, the higher the price.” Here, health plays against health, as many children suffered from a lack of exercise and loneliness due to the restrictions in the pandemic. “When we talk about easing, schools and daycare centers have to be the first,” she emphasized. “These three weeks, which we are now talking about again, we all have to go through together now.” This force now has to be applied again in order to have a real opening perspective. (dpa)
