German Prosecutor General's Office recognises "dpr" as a terrorist organisation for the first time

This week, a new espionage scandal involving Russia broke out in Germany. On Thursday, 18 April, police in Bayreuth, Bavaria, detained two men who are suspected of preparing sabotage in Germany on behalf of Russian intelligence services.

Source. This was reported by Deutsche Welle.

The detainees are German citizens of Russian descent and are accused of spying on US military bases and preparing attacks on transport routes used for military purposes.

The suspects were "members of the foreign terrorist association Donetsk People's Republic", according to an official statement by the German Prosecutor General's Office published on the same day. Thus, the German prosecutor's office actually classified the self-proclaimed DPR as a terrorist organisation.

In the story of Dieter S. and Alexander J., the mention of the "DPR" is a side issue, but an interesting one. The prosecutor's office found that Dieter S. fought on the side of the Russian-backed separatists from 2014 to 2016. But previously, the German authorities did not recognise the DPR as a terrorist association. What has changed?

In Germany, there are two ways for an organisation to be included in the terrorist list: departmental and criminal, Matthias Hartwig, a lawyer at the University of Heidelberg, explained to DW.

He explains this by using the example of the Islamist movement Hamas, which is recognised as a terrorist organisation, including at the level of the European Union, and, for example, a group that is recognised as a terrorist by a court decision.

"This does not mean that the DPR is now recognised as a terrorist organisation by the German state itself, but this accusation was made by the Prosecutor General's Office. Now the court will decide on this issue," Hartwig explained.

The Prosecutor General's Office has concluded that the DPR is a terrorist organisation, but it is unclear whether this means the entire quasi-state structure created by the separatist and Russian authorities or just some of its paramilitary part, Hartwig said.

"But judging by the statement of the Prosecutor General's Office, I assume that the agency considers the entire structure to be a terrorist organisation," the lawyer adds.

It is clear that a court in Germany may disagree with these conclusions, in which case the charges of participation in a terrorist association may fall apart, Hartwig said.

In general, according to the lawyer, the German prosecutor's office followed the conclusions of the Ukrainian authorities, which consider the DPR to be a terrorist association, "and there are good reasons for classifying the DPR as one that causes death and murder, and therefore terrorist," he concluded.

The move by the Prosecutor General's Office was also praised by the German TV channel ARD.

"German Minister of Justice Marco Buschmann has given permission for the prosecution," the journalists wrote in connection with the news of the detention of Dieter S. and Alexander J. "This step is of great symbolic importance and may have diplomatic consequences.

So far, the only diplomatic consequence has been the summoning of the Russian ambassador to the German Foreign Ministry in connection with this case, but Matthias Hartwig did not rule out that this spy scandal could lead to additional tensions between Germany and Russia.

But, he added, Germany, in his opinion, "has the right to classify structures that have assumed power in the occupied and annexed territories of a foreign state" as terrorist.