According to the same source, Chancellor Merkel condemned the attacks on December 31 as “intolerable” and said her government will “send a clear sign” to those who choose to disrespect German laws.
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Heiko Maas, the German justice minister, said “deportations would certainly be conceivable” for those sentenced to a year or more in prison.
Berlin (CNN)German authorities have identified 31 people – 18 of them asylum seekers – as suspects in violence in Cologne on New Year’s Eve, one of several such incidents reported on the same date in other European cities.
Initially, approximately 90 women reported being assaulted or robbed in the attack, which occurred on New Year’s Eve in Cologne’s central square as revelers gathered to celebrate and ring in the new year.
Two-thirds of the identified suspects were asylum seekers, said a spokesman from the German Interior Ministry on Friday, citing a preliminary report of the German Federal Police.
The police chief in Cologne was forced out of his job on Friday amid the growing uproar over the episode, which has ignited calls across the political spectrum for expelling convicted criminals, even if they are seeking asylum from war and persecution at home.
Cologne Police Spokeswoman Christoph Gilles said on Friday that at least 120 out of the 170 filed reports were of a sexual nature.
The violence outside the main railway station has sparked a debate about Germany’s open door policy on migrants.
The anti-immigration Pegida group has said it will hold a demonstration in Cologne on Saturday.
Germany has consistently ranked as one of the countries with the highest rates of rape and sexual assault in the world, well before the current crisis.
“The question that arises after Cologne is when do you lose your right to stay with us?” she said.
Moroccans, Iranians, Syrians, as well as an Iraqi, a Serb, a United States citizen and three Germans are also suspected of being involved in the actions on New Year’s Eve.
Asked about similarities to assaults in Germany, Bruun said “we are aware of what happened in Germany, but we are focusing our investigation on what happened in Kalmar”. It’s not known how a lot of all these are asylum seekers.
Interior Minister Ralf Jäger said Friday the move was necessary to “restore public confidence” in Cologne’s police force.
He has been accused of holding back information about the attacks, in particular about the origin of the suspects.
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Two men, aged 16 and 23 and apparently of North African origin, arrested overnight on Thursday in connection with the sex attacks, have been released without charge, according to German media.
