2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Developing publicity over the extent of the assaults, Frankfurt
By 8 January, the Frankfurt police had counted fifteen reported sexual attacks by groups of “Arab” or “North African” men. By 11 January 2016, the police had counted 22 reported sexual attacks by such groups on New Year's Eve. In September 2016, answering a question from a newspaper, the Staatsanwaltschaft (state attorney) declared that 60 reports of sexual harassment of women in the NYE in Frankfurt, mostly perpetrated by groups, had been brought before them.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Developing publicity over the extent of the assaults, Dortmund
On 5 January 2016, two complaints of sexual assault in the New Year's Eve in Dortmund, by groups of men addressing the women in broken German or English, have been reported to the police. That news was reported on 6 January in the local newspaper Ruhr Nachrichten.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Developing publicity over the extent of the assaults, Dortmund
By 14 January 2016, according to a report of the Minister of Justice in North Rhine-Westphalia, five suspicions of sexual insults in Dortmund in the New Year's Eve had been registered. By 18 January, four sexual offences in Dortmund in the New Year's Eve, involving seven victims, were being investigated.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Developing publicity over the extent of the assaults, Bielefeld
On 6 January 2016, the local Bielefelder newspaper Neue Westfälische and national newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reported that on New Year's Eve, in the amusement area around the Boulevard of Bielefeld, at least five young women had been sexually assaulted, mostly by groups of non-German-speaking men, whom the local police described as "immigrants" and as "Algerian and Moroccan Antanzdiebe ['charmer-thieves', 'waltzers']".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Developing publicity over the extent of the assaults, Bielefeld
The Bielefeld police stated on 6 January that two complaints had been filed by women about physical harassment on New Year's Eve. On 9 January 2016, Die Welt wrote that "several complaints" had been filed concerning sexual assaults in New Year's Eve in Bielefeld.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Developing publicity over the extent of the assaults, Bielefeld
On 16 January, the police stated that six women had filed complaints of sexual harassment; most of those reports only came after calls in the local news media. By 18 January, the Bielefeld police were investigating five sexual offences on New Year's Eve. In November 2016, a news source reported twenty offences in Bielefeld concerning last New Year's Eve, not specifying how many of them were sexual offences.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Developing publicity over the extent of the assaults, Düsseldorf
After the breaking of the news of the mass sexual assaults on New Year's Eve in Cologne, on 4 January 2016, similar reports started to reach the police in Düsseldorf. Between 4 and 6 January, around 20 reports of women having been sexually harassed were recorded; by 8 January, the number had increased to 41.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Developing publicity over the extent of the assaults, Düsseldorf
On 7 January, international news media reported the sexual assaults in Düsseldorf were committed by men of north African or Arab appearance. On 14 January 48 sexual attacks on women on New Year's Eve in Düsseldorf had been registered.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Developing publicity over the extent of the assaults, Düsseldorf
On 18 January, the police in Düsseldorf counted 69 complaints of sexual offences on New Year's Eve. By 21 January, the police mentioned 57 cases of sexual harassment, and 13 cases of insults based on sex or gender. By November 2016, 103 complaints over sexual offences in Düsseldorf on New Year's Eve had been registered by the police or public prosecutor.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Developing publicity over the extent of the assaults, Additional cities
On 14 January 2016, the WDR citing a report of the Minister of Justice in North Rhine-Westphalia reported about the last New Year's Eve:


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Developing publicity over the extent of the assaults, Additional cities
An unspecified number of sexual assaults on New Year's Eve 2015–16 took place in unspecified cities in the federal state of Hesse. Sexual assaults on New Year's Eve may have taken place in Nuremberg, Munich, Berlin, and cities in Baden-Württemberg, but the one newspaper mentioning those places did not discriminate between trick robberies (Antanzdiebstahl) and sexual offences.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In Cologne
Cologne, Germany's fourth largest city dates back to 38 BC. It is traditionally a popular venue for locals and visitors to celebrate New Year's Eve (Silvesternacht), watching the fireworks over the river Rhine and the skyline of the city. The area around the medieval Cologne Cathedral (Kölner Dom), with its Christmas market, is specifically popular around New Year's Eve, but also notorious for pickpockets and theft. One of the usual gathering locations for revellers is the plaza (Bahnhofsvorplatz) between the central train station and the Cathedral.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In Cologne
The official police account holds that around 21:00h  on 31 December 2015, some 500 men, aged 15–35, appearing Arab or North African in background,  strongly intoxicated with alcohol, had gathered on the plaza between Cologne central train station and the cathedral and were shooting fireworks into the air and at the rest of the crowd, after which this 'Arab/North African' group had grown to 1,000 men by 23:00h.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In Cologne
But a high commissioner of the Cologne police deployed that night at the scene, contended on 7 January in Die Welt that at 21:45h the crowd on the plaza and cathedral steps randomly shooting fireworks and throwing bottles, "mostly men with migration background", counted already "several thousand", and kept growing until 23:00h.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In Cologne
Around 23:30h, because of considerable danger to people and objects, or to avoid panic caused by the fireworks, the police decided to evacuate the forecourt and steps of the cathedral and the plaza in the direction of the Domprobst-Ketzer-straße. This lasted until 00:15h, and was extra laborious because of the state of intoxication of persons with alcohol, cannabis or other substances; the evacuation was "less than effective", as Cologne police chief Wolfgang Albersstated in a press conference on 4 January.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In Cologne
In a press conference on 4 January, police chief Albers stated that this evacuation was undertaken with a force of 213 police officers, which was reiterated on 10 January by police director Temme. Research by Kölner Express in March would show that it had been only 150 policemen: 80 state police (Landesbeamte) and 70 railway station security police (Bahnhofsinnere Bundespolizei). The corrected number of policemen had been transmitted to the Parliamentary Committee of the Interior of North Rhine-Westphalia on 11 January but the police spokesman could not say why the correction hadn't also been made public in January.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In Cologne
Between 22:00h and 5:00 a.m. on New Year's Night, the personal details of 71 people in the crowds near the central railway station were recorded, 32 offences recorded, 11 people were taken into custody, and four others arrested. Nevertheless, the police were not able to take all offenders into custody.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In Cologne
There are conflicting reports about when the sexual assaults started. One high-ranking Cologne police officer, in his written report to his superiors, stated that on his arrival at the cathedral and railway station plaza around 22:00h, civilians came to the policemen to tell about thefts, fights, and sexual assaults going on; also German magazine Cicero stated that sexual assaults in the area of the train station reportedly took place both before and after the evacuation of the plaza. The New York Times reported, however, that the sexual assaults began only after midnight.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In Cologne
There is no disagreement that the sexual assaults reportedly were perpetrated by men emerging from that aforementioned group of 1,000 or more mostly 'Arab or North African' men. On 2 January 2016, the police estimated the sexual attackers had worked in groups of 2 to 20 men. Witnesses said five days later that the groups were about 30 to 40 men. A report from the end of February 2016 by the Bundeskriminalamt (Federal Criminal Police) stated, the groups were mostly between 9 and 100 men, encircling lone women, sexually assaulting them (groping, rape, and insults), often combined with robbery and theft.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In Cologne
The numbers of reported sexual assaults on New Year's Eve steadily increased as of 1 January 2016. By 13 January 2016, also several complaints had been filed against the Cologne police for denial of assistance on New Year's Night. By 17 March 2016, 51 complaints had been filed against either Cologne's chief of police Wolfgang Albers or the North Rhine-Westphalian Minister of the Interior Ralf Jäger.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In other cities
Hamburg – Sexual harassment by presumed "refugees" which purportedly had troubled Hamburg's nightlife scene since the autumn of 2015 apparently reemerged on New Year's Eve 2015–16, when groups of young men in Große Freiheit encircled women, groping them between the legs, and tearing their tights and underwear. Sexual assaults that night reportedly also took place on Reeperbahn. The police had been present with 200 officers in the area of Große Freiheit and Reeperbahn but had not noticed any sexual assaults; the first and only telephone call to the Hamburger police concerning sexual harassment came at 3:00 a.m. that New Year's Night.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In other cities
Stuttgart – The earliest reported harassments and attacks on women on Stuttgart's New Year's Eve 2015–16, reported on 3 and 5 January in a local newspaper, had taken place in the city centre near Schlossplatz, Königstraße and Königsbau. Groups of men were reported to have encircled women, groped and touched them indecently, and in some cases robbed their handbags or phones. Many of the early reported victims were not residents of Stuttgart but came from minor cities like Ulm and Konstanz in the hinterland, visiting this Swabian metropolis for Silvester celebrations.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In other cities
Frankfurt – The first 22 reported sexual attacks in Frankfurt on New Year's Eve 2015–16 took place on or near the Eiserner Steg ("iron footbridge") in the city centre. In one incident a group of ten "North African" men sexually assaulted three women, in another incident three men harassed and indecently touched a group of four women and stole a phone from them. In September 2016, 60 reports of sexual harassment of women in Frankfurt on New Year's Eve, mostly perpetrated by groups, mostly on the Eiserner Steg or the banks of the river Main, had been brought before the Frankfurter Staatsanwaltschaft (state attorney).


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In other cities
Bielefeld – On New Year's Eve, hundreds of people were partying on the Boulevard of Bielefeld, among them 150 persons with a migration background, stated the police. A 23-year-old female student described how she, while heading for the cinema on the Boulevard of Bielefeld with two female friends, suddenly was surrounded by a group of eight to ten men who did not speak any German: "Everywhere there were men, who kissed me, on the forehead, on the cheeks, on the mouth". With her friend's help she escaped; they immediately turned to a police officer in the area, where they saw two weeping girls who told they had been similarly detained by men.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In other cities
Dortmund – The first two reported sexual harassment incidents in Dortmund on New Year's Eve 2015–16 took place in the city centre, where "several" men had emerged from a much larger crowd of men, approached two women who together were passing by. In one incident these men surrounded the women, in both incidents touching them indecently and either insulting them or making sexual allusions.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In other cities
Düsseldorf – During New Year's Eve 2015–16 in Düsseldorf, four incidents were reported to the police in which offences were committed by groups, but these were not obviously sexually motivated. After midnight, groups of men sexually assaulted women, mostly along the banks of the river Rhine and on the Bolkerstraße in Düsseldorf, mostly in larger crowds or in queues in front of clubs. The offenders cooperated in cornering women, who subsequently were groped in their private parts and breasts, in some cases very brutally.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Circumstances and assaults in detail, In other cities
Only as of 4 January 2016, after the news about Cologne was widely published, did reports about such sexual assaults reach the Düsseldorf police. By 21 January 2016, most of the then-70 reported sexual assaults in Düsseldorf on New Year's Eve were reported to have taken place in three adjacent boroughs in the city centre (District 1): Altstadt, Stadtmitte and Carlstadt.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Anger at media and government
Although the Cologne police directly mentioned the "North African appearance" of the suspects in their first press release about the sexual assaults on 2 January 2016, local and national news media appeared to have avoided reporting on attackers' ethnicity until the evening of 4 January. The local newspaper Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger on 1 January at 13:21 reported sexual harassment on the New Year's Eve near the Central Train Station, and so did the Cologne paper Express that day at 21:08, but neither mentioned ethnicity of the perpetrators.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Anger at media and government
After the police press conference in Cologne on 4 January 2016 at 14:00h, where the police president squarely stated that men "from appearance largely from the North African or Arab world" had committed "a very large number of sexual assaults", the prominent Süddeutsche Zeitung in its first account on its website at 15:58 still did not mention that ethnicity of the suspects. The public-service TV broadcaster ZDF at 19:00 that day in its news bulletin Heute Journal completely skipped the item of the Cologne sex assaults because they had not yet found an eyewitness confirming that alleged ethnicity of assaulters.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Anger at media and government
The national news media started reporting the ethnicity of suspects apparently on the evening of 4 January 2016: news website The Local at 19:23h, TV broadcaster ARD at 20:00 in their news bulletin Tagesschau, the Süddeutsche Zeitung at 20:19 in an adapted report on their website. ZDF on 5 January apologized for their not-reporting on 4 January: "The available information was clear enough. We've been negligent in not at least mentioning the events on 4 January in the 19:00 'Heute' bulletin. The editorial staff however decided to postpone their report to the next day when a crisis meeting was planned, to win time for extra interviews. This was clearly a misjudgement."


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Anger at media and government, Anger and suspicions of a media cover-up
Because of the perception that the ethnic background of the sex assaulters had been reported 'too late' by the mass media (see above), anger and accusations arose on Twitter and other social networking sites as of the afternoon of 4 January 2016, holding that 'the national media' or 'the news media' had been engaged in a cover-up of these New Year's Eve events or had deliberately under-reported them, for fear of encouraging anti-immigrant or anti-refugee sentiments.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Anger at media and government, Anger and suspicions of a media cover-up
Former Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich (CSU) on 5 January suggested that "the public media" for days had ignored the events, and more commentators and right-wing politicians criticized the press. The existing complaints about the ‘Lügenpresse’ ("lying press") – a term which already in 2015, 39% of German adults did not fully reject – were invigorated on the social networking sites.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Anger at media and government, Anger and suspicions of a media cover-up
News website The Local on 5 January suggested that "the national media" had only started to report on the ethnicity of the assaulters because they were forced to do so by the "social media". The German political scientist Klaus Schroeder in an interview on 6 January 2016 confirmed that, until 4 January, prominent German newspapers had indeed kept negative news about migrants away from their readers, to avoid driving the public "into the hands of extreme right".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Anger at media and government, Anger and suspicions of a media cover-up
An analyst in Die Zeit has suggested that until 4 January 2016, those national media had suppressed reporting the ethnicity of the crime suspects of New Year's Eve because the press codex in force ordered them to do so. Since those New Year's Eve events, that press codex has been revised in 2017, and both political scientist Schroeder and newspaper Die Zeit have suggested that since 4 January 2016 the German mainstream media may now mention an ethnic background of crime suspects more easily.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Anger at media and government, Anger and suspicions of a media cover-up
That discontent in Germany in January 2016 over 'the media' was echoed by the Polish Minister of Justice Zbigniew Ziobro on 9 January 2016, and by the Russian newspaper Rossiyskaya Gazeta contending: official Berlin pretended that nothing out of the ordinary had happened; regional and national German media then demonstrated an astonishing solidarity with the politicians by refusing "to illuminate the extent of robberies, assaults and rapes committed by refugees".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Anger at media and government, Anger towards authorities, government, and police
In addition to the distrust towards national news media, political commentators and right-wing politicians accused the authorities or police of trying to cover-up or ignore the New Year's Eve sexual attacks or the ethnic background of the suspects to avoid fueling a backlash against the refugees or migrants who had recently arrived in Germany in great numbers, and nearly all German press were wondering whether such political correctness had played a role in 'slow' reporting of the attacks by the police.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Anger at media and government, Anger towards authorities, government, and police
Such suspicions towards government and media were enhanced by the specifically German memories of the racial policies of the German Nazi regime (1933–45) and the already existing political controversy over Germany's 'open-door policy' towards refugees in 2015, which made criticism of the presence or the behaviour of ethnic minorities highly delicate.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Anger at media and government, Anger towards authorities, government, and police
The suspicion of a governmental cover-up proved partly correct in April 2016, when it was discovered that after a first preliminary report of the Cologne police of 2 January 2016, mentioning "rape, sexual assaults and thefts carried out by a large group of foreign nationals" on the New Year's Eve, the North Rhine-Westphalian Interior Ministry telephoned the Cologne police, asking them to tone down the report and remove the word 'rape' from it.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Anger at media and government, Anger towards authorities, government, and police
Agitation against the German government was echoed by the Polish and Russian governments. On 7 January 2016, Poland's Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski contended that the German government had presumably tried to conceal the events. Mid -January 2016, Russian newspapers made similar accusations. The state-run Russian newspaper Rossiyskaya Gazeta for example contended: at the outset, official Berlin pretended that nothing out of the ordinary had happened; regional and national German media then demonstrated an astonishing solidarity with the politicians by refusing to illuminate the extent of robberies, assaults and rapes committed by refugees.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Speculation that the attacks were premeditated
The fact that the sexual attackers on New Year's Eve in Cologne – and later in Hamburg, Stuttgart, Frankfurt, Bielefeld, Dortmund, Paderborn and Borken – had allegedly often worked in groups, in sizes from 2 up to 100 men, quickly led to speculations that those attacks had been organized. On 5 January 2016, the German Minister of Justice Heiko Maas (SPD) declared that these sex crimes were "organized crime" and also the police that day reckoned with the possibility that the attacks had been planned. On a ZDF TV broadcast on 6 January, Minister Maas toned down his earlier assessment, but repeated that "It all seems to have been agreed upon."


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Speculation that the attacks were premeditated
On 8 January 2016, it was discovered by police that one of the suspects had prepared himself for contacting or harassing women, with Arab–German translations written on a piece of paper for phrases like: "beautiful breasts", "I want sex with you" in a coarse idiom, and "I kill you". Ralf Jäger, Minister of the Interior of North Rhine-Westphalia, on 21 January nevertheless dismissed the suggestion of premeditated organized attacks.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Speculation that the attacks were premeditated
"... groups of men had agreed via social networking sites to meet at the Cologne New Year's Eve celebrations, but there was no information so far that the perpetrators had agreed upon the assaults before New Year's Eve, nor that the groups of offenders had been structured hierarchically," Jäger said. On 11 February 2016, the new Cologne police chief, Jürgen Mathies, also rejected the idea of organized crime. The gathering of young men at the central train station came about organically via social networking sites. "There's nothing that hints at organized crime.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Speculation that the attacks were premeditated
Rather it is so that such sexual assaults by groups are also a huge problem in, for example, Cairo. These perpetrators probably knew this behaviour, of surrounding and then abusing women with many other men from their country of descent," said Mathies. The tabloid website Daily Express nevertheless kept suggesting that the "Cologne mass sex attack 'was organised and plotted on social media' says police chief".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Descriptions of offenders before their identification
Stuttgart – In the first reported case of sexual assault on New Year's Eve 2015–16 in Stuttgart, reported on 3 January 2016 by a local newspaper, the attackers were described as a group of "southern people" with "Arab" looks.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Descriptions of offenders before their identification
Cologne – The police president of Cologne, Wolfgang Albers, on 4 January 2016 at a press conference described the offenders of the sexual assaults in the New Year's Eve in Cologne as young men "from appearance largely from the north African or Arab world", after all witnesses had given that racial description to the police. Albers also stated that many of the offenders had been known to the police for some time, therefore were not newly-arrived refugees. On 5 January, Albers estimated the ages of the offenders as between 15 and 35 or between 18 and 35.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Descriptions of offenders before their identification
Hamburg – The Hamburg police in its announcement on 5 January 2016 described the perpetrators of the sexual harassment on New Year's Eve as men "with southern or Arab looks" "in some cases," operating in groups of perhaps 20 to 40 persons. The Hamburger Abendblatt stated on 20 January that "most of the victims have supposedly described the perpetrators as southerners (Südländer), North Africans, or people with dark skin". Of the first eight identified suspects of sexual offences in Hamburg on New Year's Eve, some were refugees, while others had a migration background, said the police on 14 January 2016.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Descriptions of offenders before their identification
Dortmund – Several of the perpetrators of sexual attacks on New Year's Eve 2015–16 in Dortmund were described on 5 January as speaking broken German or broken English.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Descriptions of offenders before their identification
Frankfurt – The victims of the first 22 reported sexual attacks on New Year's Eve 2015–16 in Frankfurt described the perpetrators, between 5 and 11 January, as groups of men from Arab or north African origin.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Descriptions of offenders before their identification
Bielefeld – All six women who had been sexually harassed in Bielefeld on New Year's Eve 2015–16 described their harassers as men with migration backgrounds; these same men were described by the police on 6 January as "immigrants", mostly Algerians and Moroccans.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Descriptions of offenders before their identification
Düsseldorf – On 8 January 2016, all 41 victims in Düsseldorf of sexual attacks on New Year's Eve described their assailants as North African or Arab in appearance. By 14 January, in nearly all 48 reported cases, the perpetrators had been described by the witnesses as "Arab", "North African" or "southern".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Descriptions of offenders before their identification
Further German cities – Several women who reported having been sexually harassed in Paderborn on New Year's Eve 2015–16 described the perpetrators as "north African" men; two victims in Detmold described the offenders as "foreign" looking men. The federal state of Hesse described some of the perpetrators of sexual assaults in its cities that New Year's Eve as men with "north African/Arab/southern European/eastern European" appearance.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Confusion over the role of refugees
All of GermanyIn July 2016, the Bundeskriminalamt (German Federal Criminal Police) stated that approximately half of the 120 identified suspects nationwide of sexual violence on New Year's Eve appeared to have come to Germany in 2015 with the great flow of refugees which that year had reached Germany, and most of the suspects came from North Africa. The Bundeskriminalamt further explained that in their terminology, asylum seekers, people granted asylum, and people only on sufferance in the country (because expulsion had not yet occurred), are all referred to as "refugees".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Confusion over the role of refugees
CologneOn 4 January 2016, Cologne's police president Wolfgang Albers stated that many of the offenders of the sexual assaults on New Year's Eve had been known to the police for some time; therefore, they were not newly-arrived refugees, which he contradicted the next day by saying that the police "has no knowledge yet about the offenders".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Confusion over the role of refugees
On 5 January, Cologne mayor Henriette Reker said in a press conference that there were no indications of "refugees" being among the perpetrators of the sexual assaults, and that presumptions of that sort were "completely intolerable"; she judged it "completely improper (…) to link a group that appeared to come from North Africa with the refugees" who had arrived in record numbers in Germany in the year 2015. However, Arnold Plickert, President of the German police union Gewerkschaft der Polizei in North Rhine-Westphalia, said on 7 January that "there were most certainly refugees among the perpetrators".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Confusion over the role of refugees
On 8 January, 31 suspects of various offences during New Year's Eve in Cologne had been identified: 18 of them appeared to be asylum seekers, according to the Federal Ministry of the Interior. The same day, several of the mobile phones stolen in the New Year's Eve were traced by the police within or in the vicinity of refugees' residences.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Confusion over the role of refugees
On around 15 February, the British online newspaper The Independent stated that of the first 73 identified suspects accused of robbing or sexually harassing women or committing other offences on New Year's Eve in Cologne, only three were refugees. Cologne's chief prosecutor Bremer angrily protested against that view, stating that the great majority of them were either asylum seekers, asylum applicants, or illegal immigrants which he considered all to "fall into the general category of refugees".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Confusion over the role of refugees
In June 2016, the Bundeskriminalamt (German Federal Criminal Police Office) further explained, that the majority of the men harassing women on the Cathedral Plaza in Cologne in the New Year's Eve had been of north African or Arab origin and most offenders in Cologne had come to Germany as refugee in 2015, and that in the Police's terminology, asylum seekers, people granted asylum, and people only on sufferance in the country (because expulsion had not yet occurred), are all referred to as "refugees".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Confusion over the role of refugees
Hamburg – Some of the first eight identified suspects in the New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Hamburg were identified as "refugees" according to the police on 14 January 2016.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Confusion over the role of refugees
Frankfurt – The first ten arrested suspects of sexual attacks on New Year's Eve 2015–16 in Frankfurt were all refugees, said the Frankfurter police on 11 January.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Confusion over the role of refugees
Detmold – Two reported rape attempts on New Year's Eve 2015–16 in Detmold, by "foreign" looking men, were reported as having taken place "in direct vicinity of a refugees' shelter".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Confusion over the role of refugees
Borken (NRW) – Two reported sexual assaults on girls in Borken (North Rhine-Westphalia) on New Year's Eve 2015–16 were attributed by police to "several asylum seekers".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Comparisons and interpretations, Tahrir Square
Newspapers on 4 and 5 January 2016 immediately pointed out that, although massive sexual harassment was unknown in modern Germany and Europe, the Cologne New Year's Eve events strongly resembled mass sexual assaults on Tahrir Square in Cairo, Egypt, during political mass demonstrations in 2005, 2006 and 2013. The Bundeskriminalamt (German Federal Criminal Police Office) on 10 January asserted that the phenomenon of communal sexual harassment is known in several Arab countries, where it purportedly is called taharrush gamea. In February 2016, new Cologne police chief Jürgen Mathies stated, "Such sexual assaults by groups are also a huge problem in, for example, Cairo. These perpetrators probably knew this behaviour of surrounding and then abusing women with many other men from their country of descent".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Comparisons and interpretations, Tahrir Square
In January 2016, an Iranian-American writer and student of anthropology had put in perspective suggestions from Western commentators that mass sexual harassment is part of Arab culture, saying that such sexual harassment is not common practice in Egypt or in other parts of the Arab world, where it is as shocking to average people as anywhere else.. This argument appears specious and untrue in light of other authoritative sources, which confirm that mass sexual assault is part of the cultural script in Egypt, example: .


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Comparisons and interpretations, Comparison to violence on other celebrations from native German-born men
On 6 January 2016, during a women's discussion in Cologne, one of them contended that the sexual harassment on New Year's Eve had not been different from the violence during other big celebrations in the city, and that it had only become a burning topic for the media this time because "refugees" or "migrants", who had recently became a controversial issue in Germany, were the accused perpetrators this time, instead of native German-born men.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Comparisons and interpretations, Comparison to violence on other celebrations from native German-born men
Likewise, two female journalists, in a column in Time on 11 January, noted that the public discussions since "Cologne" had quickly focused on migrants and Muslim men not being adjusted to Western culture, and had thus become one more fight with men against other men, thereby ignoring the fact that sexual harassment during public festivals in Germany had become an urgent problem in recent years.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Comparisons and interpretations, Comparison to violence on other celebrations from native German-born men
Likewise, on 13 January, 22 German feminists pleaded in an open letter that the anger after the Cologne incidents should not be directed against groups or ethnicities like Muslims, Arabs, blacks, and North Africans; sexualised violence is omnipresent everyday and not only a problem of 'the others' who are not white 'non-Germans'.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Comparisons and interpretations, Sexual assault as a tactic for robbery?
On 2 January 2016, when nearly 30 complaints about robbery and/or sexual assault in Cologne during New Year's Eve had reached the Cologne police, the police had presumed, via a press release, that the suspects had used sexual groping as a mere tactic to distract women, while at the same time robbing these same women of mobile phones and wallets. Five days later, several Cologne police officers anonymously told the press their contrasting view, which was that most of the sexual perpetrators had been groping or assaulting primarily for their "sexual amusement".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Comparisons and interpretations, Inadequate police response
On 11 January 2016, the North Rhine-Westphalian Minister-President Kraft (SPD) and North Rhine-Westphalian Interior Minister Jäger (SPD) criticised the Cologne police for not having requested police reinforcements which they said had been on standby on New Year's Eve. After parliamentary inquiries lasting from March until November 2016, the SPD fraction in the North Rhine-Westphalian state parliament concluded again that "the deployment of the security forces in the Silvesternacht (New Year's Night) in Cologne had gone wrong, with grave consequences for the women affected".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Comparisons and interpretations, Inadequate police response
The Dutch news website de Correspondent analysed, that considering the crowded situation near Cologne's central train station in the NYE, the police forces’ coordination had been inadequate.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Comparisons and interpretations, Perfume and drugs
A Cologne-based imam, in an interview for a Russian television channel around 20 January 2016, tried to 'excuse' the attacks by asserting that women on New Year's Eve were lightly dressed and wore perfume; young men had taken pills or drugs or had drunk alcohol, were therefore disinhibited, and thus groped those women.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Comparisons and interpretations, Bundeskriminalamt: a combination of six factors
A report from the end of February 2016 by the Bundeskriminalamt (Federal Criminal Police) analyzing hundreds of cases of alleged sexual assault in Cologne, Hamburg, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt am Main, and Stuttgart on New Year's Eve, which was made public in June 2016, mentioned factors that seem to have favoured those sexual assaults (by groups):


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Shock
The President of the German police union Gewerkschaft der Polizei in North Rhine-Westphalia, Arnold Plickert, said on 4 January 2016 over the sexual attacks in Cologne: "This is a totally new dimension of violence. Such a thing was unknown to us, until now"; the strongly alcoholized perpetrators had acted "fully unleashed violent". Shock dominated the headlines of the German newspapers of 4 and 5 January.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Shock
On 5 January, also Cologne's police chief Albers called the sex attacks "a completely new dimension of crime", but the German Justice Minister Heiko Maas (SPD) that day went even further, declaring these assaults a "completely new dimension of organized criminality". A Frankfurt police spokesman reacted on 6 January 2016: "The phenomenon of large groups of men massively sexually harassing women in this manner was unknown to us until now".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Suggestions to close the German borders
A Member of the German Parliament for the CDU party, Steffen Bilger, wrote on Twitter in the evening of 4 January 2016, reacting on 'Cologne': "It can't go on like this. Urgently needed: reduction of influx".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Suggestions to close the German borders
Ross Douthat, a columnist for The New York Times, on 9 January 2016 advised Germany to close its borders for new immigrants for the time being, because: – ordinary Germans don't want the generous immigration policies which led to one million immigrants in 2015; – immigrants will have difficulties in assimilation; – immigrants will commit violence and terrorism, see the recent attacks in Paris (January 2015 and November 2015), see now 'Cologne'; – immigrants in such high numbers could Islamificate Europe; – many among the large numbers of young immigrated men in Europe and Germany in 2015 hold unacceptable views on women.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Suggestions to close the German borders
On 12 January, Hans-Jürgen Papier, former head of the German Federal Constitutional Court, stated that the government should separate its granting of asylum from its migration policies and "secure the borders" of Germany. On 19 January 2016, the German Minister of Transportation Alexander Dobrindt of the Bavarian CSU party also recommended closure of the German borders.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Hardening attitudes towards migrants and refugees
Mr. Von Mengersen, head of the nationalist Pro NRW party in Germany, reacted on 4 or 5 January 2016, recalling the recent large influx of migrants into Germany: "We locals can no longer put up with everything that is being routinely swept under the rug based on a false sense of tolerance". Other far-right and anti-immigrant groups gave similar reactions that day. The liberal conservative German magazine Cicero, in more guarded terms, blamed the migrants by suggesting "the government's loss of control" on who enters Germany had caused these New Year's Eve's sexual assaults.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Hardening attitudes towards migrants and refugees
U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump tweeted on 6 January: "Germany is going through massive attacks to its people by the migrants (…)". The German CSU's secretary-general Andreas Scheuer between 4 and 9 January tweeted: "It is unbearable that in major German cities, women are sexually assaulted and robbed in the street by young migrants"; the CDU had between 4 and 9 January proposed in a draft announcement that allegedly suspicious refugees should be taken into custody. The Prime Minister of Slovakia, Robert Fico, on 7 January said he would make a concentrated effort to prevent Muslim migrants from entering Slovakia. The Czech Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka on 8 January supported Fico's proposal. On 8 January, Fico added that "The migrants cannot be integrated". The Belgian immigration minister on 8 January ordered migrants to take courses in "respect for women".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Hardening attitudes towards migrants and refugees
On 7 January, the North Rhine-Westphalian Interior Minister Ralf Jäger said that anti-immigrant groups were using the New Year's Eve sex assaults to stir up hatred against refugees: "What happens on the right-wing platforms and in chat rooms is at least as awful as the acts of those assaulting the women... This is poisoning the climate of our society."


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Hardening attitudes towards migrants and refugees
On 9 January, German Chancellor Angela Merkel promised tougher action and measures against criminals of foreign nationality, and on 11 January she reacted to the sex attacks, saying: "Refugees are coming to Europe and we are vulnerable, as we see (…)". On 11 January, at a rally in Leipzig organized by Pegida, banner signs read: "Rapefugees not welcome".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Hardening attitudes towards migrants and refugees
On 12 January 2016, research by online Internet research firm YouGov showed that the percentage of Germans who consider the number of asylum seekers in Germany "too high" had sharply risen from 53% in November 2015 to 62% in the period of 8–11 January 2016.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, "An arm's length distance" statement
In a press conference in the afternoon of 5 January 2016, Cologne's mayor Henriette Reker (nonpartisan politician) – who herself had been attacked with a knife and gravely wounded 2½ months earlier – after being asked how women could protect themselves from assaults like those on New Year's Eve, answered that women should keep "an arm's length distance" from people with whom they don't know well. This drew outrage not only on social media, but even from the government of the Netherlands, suggesting that Reker had blamed the victims with her remark.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Demonstrations against sexual violence and against blaming it on migrants
In the evening of 5 January 2016, between 200 and 300 people, mostly women, protested outside the Cologne Cathedral, demanding respect for women and action from Chancellor Angela Merkel. On 9 January, a second flashmob demonstration took place, on the forecourt and steps of the Cologne cathedral, against "violence against women", by at least a thousand men and women.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Demonstrations against sexual violence and against blaming it on migrants
On 13 January, 22 German feminists pleaded in an open letter that the anger after the Cologne incidents should not be directed against groups or ethnicities such as Muslims, Arabs, blacks, or North Africans, as sexualised violence is omnipresent everyday and not only a problem emanating from 'the others' who are non-white 'non-Germans'. A feminist protest against sexism and against anti-migrant, anti-refugee sentiment that purportedly surged in the wake of the New Year's Eve sexual attacks was held in Cologne on 12 March 2016.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Deportation
In reaction to the sexual assaults, Hannelore Kraft (SPD), Minister-President of North Rhine-Westphalia, said on 5 January 2016 that perpetrators should be deported if possible. On 8 January, vice chancellor for the SPD and Minister for Economics Sigmar Gabriel fell in line with these sentiments, saying: "criminal asylum applicants [should be] sent back to their homeland" and Hamburg's mayor Olaf Scholz (SPD) also advocated faster deportation of criminal migrants, specifically the perpetrators of these New Year's Eve assaults.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Deportation
On 9 January, the rival German centre party CDU went even further, saying that migrants sentenced to imprisonment on probation should, under current circumstances, be deported too. In July 2016, Germany's parliament passed a new law on sex crimes which would make it easier to deport a migrant after committing a sex offence.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, More police and video surveillance
North Rhine-Westphalian Interior Minister Ralf Jäger (SPD) said on 7 January 2016 that the police have to learn from these events and "conceptually adjust" to the fact that groups of men can assault women en masse. In July 2016, the Bundeskriminalamt (German Federal Criminal Police) President Mönch demanded more police presence and video surveillance in response to these assaults.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Anti-Muslim and anti-Islam sentiment
The Prime Minister of Slovakia, Robert Fico, said on 7 January 2016 he would make a concentrated effort to prevent Muslim migrants from entering Slovakia. On 8 January, the Czech Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka supported Fico's proposal. On 10 January, journalist Harald Martenstein wrote in Der Tagesspiegel: "An Islamic socialization produces a conception of women that often leads to such crimes".On 11 January, at a rally in Leipzig organized by Pegida, banner signs read: "Islam not welcome".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Anti-Muslim and anti-Islam sentiment
In May 2016, the German journalist, publisher, and feminist Alice Schwarzer wrote that the assaulters of the Cologne New Year's Eve had been "fanaticized followers of Sharia Islam…they were not average Muslims [but] the type of men who place sharia above the law and the woman below the man… Most of the German Muslim organizations have been busying themselves in recent decades with infiltrating the sharia into our legal system". President Kaddor of the German Liberal Islamic Society retorted that Schwarzer is doing "what many Islam-hostile instigators do." The usage of the term 'Sharia-Islam' shows that Schwarzer is not interested in clarifying, but just in using provocative language, said Kaddor. She dismissed the charge of trying to infiltrate the German legal system with sharia as "nonsense".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Suggestion of terrorist links to the European migrant crisis
On 7 January 2016, Poland's Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski contended that the migration wave to Europe, which he linked to the Cologne events, had been used by ISIL or other terrorist organizations.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Suggestions to secure the 'Schengen' borders
On 8 January 2016, the Prime Minister of Hungary, Viktor Orbán, called for a complete halt to migration into Europe. If borders of the Schengen Zone are not controlled, the Schengen system (i.e. free movement of people within the participating countries) will collapse, he said. On 15 January, the German Minister of Finance, Wolfgang Schäuble (CDU), also stated that: "We must now secure the outer Schengen borders".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Suggestions to secure the 'Schengen' borders
Economic Professor Emeritus Hans-Werner Sinn (1948), ranked by several papers as one of the leading German intellectuals, reacted on 1 February 2016 to "the Cologne New Year's Eve events", stating:Germany, because of its history, has a lasting obligation to protect those who are politically persecuted, but not to put up with a massive and uncontrolled rush of economic refugees.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Suggestions to secure the 'Schengen' borders
If a state, for example Germany, neglects to effectively protect its borders and thus to protect its public assets and its social security system, chaos, violence and inefficiency would damage that state to such a degree that it could no longer fulfil its aforementioned humanitary assignments. In the current situation though, with Germany being part of the Schengen Area, it would suffice for Germany if the outer borders of that Schengen Zone were effectively protected, which presently would require most of all protecting the Schengen outer borders of Italy and Slovenia.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Suggestions to secure the 'Schengen' borders
Italy, Sinn suggested, should bring the refugees back to Africa as – according to Sinn – Spain was already doing; Slovenia should be assisted in securing its outside Schengen border. On those controlled outer Schengen borders, reception camps for arriving asylum applicants could then be erected, and the asylum applicants qualifying there for asylum according to uniform European asylum criteria could be distributed over those Schengen countries willing to accept their share of them.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Criticism of racism in reactions
The Süddeutsche Zeitung newspaper published on Saturday, 9 January 2016 an illustration of a black arm reaching up between white female legs, which has been criticised as racism by other media and journalists; the Süddeutsche apologised for it the next day.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Criticism of racism in reactions
On its 9 January front cover, the German magazine Focus showed a naked blonde white woman, stained by black handprints all over her body, accompanied by the text: "After the sex attacks by migrants: Are we still tolerant or already blind?" On 11 January, columnist Jakob Augstein, writing in Spiegel Online, denounced this as an implicit racist message, suggesting: 'it's okay for white men to abuse white women, but not for men of the other human racial groupings'. Al Jazeera America condemned the cover image as a "racist machination as archaic as the tale of Shakespeare's Othello". A similar picture was published on the cover of the Polish weekly paper Sieci in early 2016: a blonde woman, wrapped in the European flag, grabbed from several sides by dark, hairy arms. The title of the linked article was "The Islamic rape of Europe".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Satire
The French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo on 13 January 2016 published a cartoon, recalling the Kurdish-Syrian three-year-old boy Alan Kurdi who, in September 2015, while fleeing with his family from the Syrian civil war, had drowned in the Mediterranean Sea. The dramatic photo of his dead body, published by nearly every serious news medium in the Western world, had elicited on the one hand awe and commiseration, and on the other hand irritation at 'dead-child porn for progressives'. Charlie Hebdo pictured Alan Kurdi as a grown-up man lecherously chasing a running blonde woman. The accompanying text goes: "Migrants. Que sérait devenu le petit Aylan s'il avait grandi? Tripoteur de fesses en Allemagne" ("Migrants. What would little Aylan have grown up to be? Ass groper in Germany").


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Remarks that the federal government had suspended the constitutional state
Two professors of constitutional law and former members of the German Federal Constitutional Court, Udo Di Fabio and Hans-Jürgen Papier, remarked on 14 January 2016 that the federal government had suspended the constitutional state by unconditionally opening the country's borders in 2015.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Russian television misquoting a German imam
On around 20 January 2016, Russian television channel REN TV cited the Cologne-based imam Sami Abu-Yusuf as blaming the women for the sexual assaults, because they had been walking around perfumed and 'half-naked'. The next day, the imam protested in a German newspaper that his words had been mistranslated by that TV station, and that he had only tried to give as a possible explanation, without justifying the assaults, the combination of women being lightly dressed and wearing perfume with young men being disinhibited by pills, drugs, or alcohol.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Germany facing migration challenge
Within weeks, it was clear that most suspects of the sexual assaults had come from North Africa. Analyst Michelle Martin, for website reuters.com on 28 January 2016, considered that Germany appeared "unprepared for the migration challenge":"300,000–500,000 young men, without families in Germany, sitting around without much to do, having come from a male-dominated culture" in North Africa, as a German criminologist and former justice minister from the SPD party had put it. Also, these men were not legally permitted to work. Virtually none of them was entitled asylum as a 'genuine refugee'.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Germany facing migration challenge
About 40% of migrants from North Africa in Germany committed a crime within a year, said a North Rhine-Westphalia police report from 8 January 2016. These young men had arrived with high hopes for life in "paradise", but soon found out all they got was a bed and a small stipend, as the vice-president of the German Moroccan society described it. Thus, these men were vulnerable to being "corrupted by a ringleader who says: let's rob the department store or steal a mobile phone or clothes, and we'll have a bit of money when we sell them".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, Suggestion that a wrong perception has taken hold
In May 2016, the Dutch news website de Correspondent, in an analysis of the publicity since 4 January 2016, suggested that an incorrect public perception of the Cologne attacks, as "a mob of 1,000 refugees going after the women of Germany", had taken hold in the first three days and never went away. It suggested as a more accurate perception, that only "dozens" of young men were suspected of sexual assaults in Cologne.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Further reactions, "An end to euphoria"
Two years later in 2018, the editorial staff of the Spiegel Online magazine postulated that the events of Cologne's 2015–16 New Year's Eve had ended "the sense of euphoria that had accompanied the welcoming of hundreds of thousands of refugees into Germany in 2015".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Responses (in actions), Pepper spray, weapons licences
Immediately after 4 January 2016 reports about Cologne, sales to women of pepper spray for self-defense exploded in Germany. In the first three weeks of January 2016, requests for small weapons licences (Kleiner Waffenschein) in Cologne and Leverkusen have doubled in comparison to the previous year.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Responses (in actions), Vigilante committee
In Düsseldorf, where later 103 complaints over sexual offences in the New Year's Eve would be registered, a vigilante group was founded on 5 January 2016 in reaction to the then published events in Cologne. The Facebook page of this Düsseldorf passt auf ("Düsseldorf Watches Out") group garnered 3,300 members within two days.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Responses (in actions), Cologne police chief discharged
Cologne's chief of police Wolfgang Albers was soon criticized, also bearing in mind his questionable performance in two affairs in previous years. On 6 January 2016, the FDP's leader Christian Lindner bluntly stated: "Cologne needs a new start for security, also regarding personnel".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Responses (in actions), Cologne police chief discharged
On 8 January, even the German Police Trade Union's president Rainer Wendt severely criticized Albers, saying the chief of police  together with the police force under his responsibility had caused a communication disaster by first stating the New Year's Eve had passed calmly, later having to admit this first information had been wrong. The same day, Cologne's mayor Reker accused Albers of holding information from her, not informing her that 58% of the first 31 suspects of various offences in the New Year's Eve had indeed appeared to be asylum seekers. Later on 8 January 2016, the North Rhine-Westphalian interior minister Ralf Jaeger gave Wolfgang Albers an early retirement, other sources say it was mayor Reker who pensioned Albers off.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Responses (in actions), Investigation on communal sexual harassment
On 10 January 2016, the Bundeskriminalamt (Federal Criminal Police) announced a nationwide investigation in Germany on communal sexual harassment, purportedly known as taharrush gamea in Arab countries.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Responses (in actions), Violence against foreigners
On Sunday, 10 January 2016, six Pakistanis were attacked in the city of Cologne by around 20 people. Two of them briefly needed treatment in a hospital. Five people that same night attacked one Syrian man in Cologne who also was injured. In addition, three Guinean men were attacked. According to British newspaper The Daily Telegraph, "a group of thugs" in Cologne was planning a "manhunt" for migrants.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Responses (in actions), Updating the law on sexual violence
On 11 January 2016, columnist Jakob Augstein in Spiegel Online argued that the German laws concerning sex crimes were lagging behind, because under the current law, unconsensual sex in Germany was only a penal offence in case the unwilling participant had physically, noticeably defended himself or herself: simply saying "No" was not enough to find a defendant guilty. Around 12 January 22 self-declared German feminists in an open letter pleaded that the German law should make sexual harassment a criminal offence, and the issue was further debated in German society.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Responses (in actions), Updating the law on sexual violence
In July 2016, partly in reaction to the sex attacks in Cologne in the 2016 New Year's Eve, the Bundestag (German Parliament) with huge majority passed a new law, classifying groping as a sex crime, clarifying that "No means No" even if a victim does not fight back. This new law also makes it easier to deport a migrant after committing a sex offence.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Responses (in actions), Increased police surveillance
In reaction to the sexual assaults, by mid-January 2016 police presence had been increased in Große Freiheit in Hamburg.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Responses (in actions), Increased police surveillance
Before the 2016 Carnival events took place, from 4 until 9 February, the police in Cologne had prepared a force of over 2,500 officers, more than three times the number of the previous year. On the first night of the Carnival, the police presence in Cologne was doubled in comparison to the previous year, with over 2,000 police officers.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Responses (in actions), Increased police surveillance
On the first night of the Düsseldorf Carnival of 4 February 2016, the police presence was also doubled compared to the previous year.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Responses (in actions), Police raids on criminal refugees and North Africans
Between 17 and 23 January 2016, the police in North Rhine-Westphalia  pursued five raids, purportedly to search for delinquents among immigrants. On Sunday, 17 January, nearly 300 police officers sealed off several streets in the vicinity of Düsseldorf Hauptbahnhof, to check out some 300 North Africans in the area. On 19 January, police showed up in refugee shelters in the small town of Ahlen. On 19 and 20 January, police cruised the Kalk district of Cologne where they arrested six people. On 22 January before dawn, dozens of policemen visited refugee shelters in Recklinghausen and woke all residents up. "Repeatedly" during these raids, police encountered either illegal residents or people who had committed crimes, as newpapaper Die Welt asserted.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Responses (in actions), Restraining orders
On 27 January 2016, the Cologne police placed restraining orders on some of the New Year's Eve suspects, for the area of Cologne's old town,cathedral, and central train station, during the Carnival celebrations lasting from 4 until 9 February.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Responses (in actions), Closing of a girls' high school
On 30 January 2016, a girls' Gymnasium, the archiepiscopal Ursulinenschule in Cologne, announced that the school would remain closed on the day of Weiberfastnacht (women's fasting night), on 4 February. The first night of the street carnival is part of a first day which traditionally comprises a reversal of the normal hierarchy between the sexes, in which the women rule over the town for one day. A school leader asserted to the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger newspaper: "We want to spare our female pupils the road to school, on this day [...] For us, the security of the girls comes first". Other schools in Cologne, however, chose to discuss the New Year's Eve's events in the classroom, educating the pupils on alcohol use, date rape drugs, and pepper spray.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Investigations, Evaluating video recordings
As of early January 2016, the Cologne police evaluated 1,100 hours of video footage from surveillance cameras and from telephones of witnesses, but on 18 January, a policeman anonymously said to the press that several of the video recordings of the Cologne Cathedal plaza on New Year's Eve were unusable. In November 2016, the Ministry of Internal Affairs of North Rhine-Westphalia confirmed, that because of those crime scenes in Cologne having been both dark and overcrowded, those video images had mostly proven to be of poor quality and therefore not very helpful for the investigations.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Investigations, Publishing photos or video
HamburgIn Hamburg, on 20 January 2016 the police published photos of two suspects of sexual assaults on New Year's Eve,which led to the recognition of one of them - a 29-year-old male migrant from Afghanistan - the next day, by a guard in a refugee center, and the suspect's arrest.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Investigations, Publishing photos or video
On 26 January, the Hamburger police published a photo taken with a surveillance camera of a 33-year-old Iranian man who was suspected to have groped two young women on New Year's Eve, which led to him being recognized by one victim and his subsequent arrest.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Investigations, Publishing photos or video
On 4 February, the Hamburger police released photos of two further suspects; the national TV series Aktenzeichen XY … ungelöst ("Case number XY … unsolved") was also used for the tracing of Hamburg perpetrators.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Investigations, Publishing photos or video
DüsseldorfIn February 2016, an 18-year-old girl from Mönchengladbach, sexually harassed in Düsseldorf on New Year's Eve, recognized her harasser on television, which led to his arrest on around 14 February.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Investigations, Publishing photos or video
CologneOn 8 March 2016, the Cologne police published the first five photos of suspects of sexual harassment on New Year's Eve, quickly leading to the arrest of two of them.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Investigations, Checking previously suspected North Africans
Since 2014, the Düsseldorf police  in the so-called "Casablanca"-project had registered 2,200 suspects from North Africa who were supposedly criminally active, in Düsseldorf. The Düsseldorf police said on 6 January 2016 that they were now investigating whether any of those suspects were involved in the theft and sex crimes on Cologne New Year's Eve 2015–16.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Investigations, Putting up rewards
Cologne – On 15 January 2016, the state attorney of North Rhine-Westphalia offered 10,000 euro as a reward for informations that would lead to the tracing of perpetrators of the Cologne New Year's Eve sexual assaults, to be shared among all informants.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Investigations, Putting up rewards
Hamburg – The Hamburg police on 4 February 2016 offered 2,000 euro for information leading to the tracing of perpetrators of the New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Hamburg.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Difficulty in proving guilt
The Hamburg professor of law Reinhard Merkel stated on 18 January 2016, "I don't suppose the perpetrators will be sentenced". This was because for a conviction, it is mandatory that the victim is fully sure of the identity of the offender, and that her statements on this point are credible enough. However, he added: "In many cases, when asked whether she is 100% sure of it, she will admit honestly, from fear of a false statement and under pressure of the defence, that she is not absolutely sure".


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Suspects
GeneralOn 7 January 2016, police reported sixteen suspects of mob sex attacks on the past New Year's Eve in Cologne, Hamburg, or other cities.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Suspects
In July 2016, the Bundeskriminalamt (German Federal Criminal Police) stated that more than 2,000 men had participated in sexual offences on New Year's Eve in all of Germany, but doubted whether more than the 120 identified so far would ever be identified. In November 2016, newspaper Die Welt confirmed that most of the suspects of various offences on the past New Year's Eve in Germany had not been identified.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Identified suspects
GeneralOn 8 January 2016, the German federal police knew the names of 31 suspects of various offences on New Year's Eve nationwide, most of them for inflicting physical harm or robbery; none of them were suspected of sexual offences.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Identified suspects
In June 2016, the Bundeskriminalamt (German Federal Criminal Police) declared that 70% of the suspects of sexual offences in Germany on New Year's Eve had been in Germany for less than a year, but in July 2016 they said that only 50% of the identified suspects had been in Germany for less than a year. By July 2016, most of the 120 identified suspects of sexual violence in the New Year's Eve in Germany were originally from North Africa.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Identified suspects
CologneOn 8 January 2016, the Federal Ministry of the Interior stated that 31 suspects of various offences during New Year's Eve in Cologne had been identified by name. They included nine Algerians, eight Moroccans, four Syrians, five Iranians, two Germans, an Iraqi, a Serb, and an American. On 10 January 2016, the Cologne police were investigating 19 named suspects of various offences in Cologne on New Year's Eve: all of them were non-Germans, ten were asylum applicants, nine others presumably illegally in Germany, 14 of them were men from Morocco or Algeria.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Identified suspects
On 11 January, the number of identified suspects of various crimes in Cologne on New Year's Eve was reported to be 23. On 20 January, the Cologne authorities had traced 30 suspects in relation to various offences on New Year's Eve, all North Africans, 25 of them having originated in Morocco or Algeria. On 21 January, Ralf Jäger, Minister of the Interior of North Rhine-Westphalia, stated that those 30 identified Cologne suspects were not member of a known pickpocketing gang. On 28 January, the police knew of 35 suspects of New Year's Eve crimes, among them three suspects for sexual crimes; most suspects came from Morocco, Algeria, or Tunisia.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Identified suspects
Around 7 February 2016, a young woman identified from police photos eight presumed perpetrators of sexual offences in Cologne on New Year's Eve. By mid-February, 73 suspects of various criminal offences during Cologne's New Year's Eve had been identified. They included 30 Moroccans, 27 Algerians, 4 Iraqis, 3 Tunisians, 3 Syrians, 3 Germans, and one each from Libya, Iran, and Montenegro.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Identified suspects
As of 6 April 2016, the Cologne police had traced 153 suspects in relation to various offences on New Year's Eve; 149 of them were foreigners, with 103 of this group from Morocco or Algeria, 68 asylum applicants, 18 others presumably illegally living in Germany. Four of these suspects were unaccompanied underaged refugees.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Identified suspects
In June 2016, the Bundeskriminalamt (German Federal Criminal Police) declared that the majority of the men harassing women on the Cathedral Plaza in Cologne in the New Year's Eve had been of north African or Arab origin, and that most offenders in Cologne had come to Germany as refugee in 2015. By November 2016, in 140 cases of alleged sexual offences in Cologne on New Year's Eve, at least one suspect had been identified.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Identified suspects
FrankfurtOn 11 January 2016, the Frankfurter police had identified and arrested ten suspects of sexual attacks in the New Year's Eve 2015–16 in Frankfurt, they were all refugees.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Identified suspects
HamburgOn 14 January 2016, the Hamburg police had traced eight suspects who had committed various offences or sexual assaults on New Year's Eve in Hamburg; some of them were refugees, some lived in the city for years, while others had a migration background. On both 21 January and 5 February, an identified suspect of sexual assault in the New Year's Eve in Hamburg was arrested, they were migrants from Afghanistan and Iran.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Identified suspects
StuttgartOn 17 January 2016, in Stuttgart, an asylum seeker from Iraq was identified and arrested as suspect of harassing two girls in the New Year's Eve.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Identified suspects
DortmundIn  Dortmund, on 18 January 2016, the police said that of the first nine identified suspects of various offences on New Year's Eve, seven were foreigners. By November 2016, at least five suspects strictly of sexual offences in Dortmund in the New Year's Eve had been identified, and persecuted.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Identified suspects
Düsseldorf In Düsseldorf, on 20 January 2016, nine suspects of various offences on New Year's Eve had been identified; eight of them were originally from abroad. By November 2016, for 41 sexual offences on New Year's Eve in Düsseldorf, the officials had traced one or more suspects.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Identified suspects
Bielefeld In  Bielefeld, on 20 January 2016, four suspects of various offences on New Year's Eve had been traced, all from Morocco or Algeria. By November 2016, in 15 out of 20 judicial proceedings for various offences on New Year's Eve in Bielefeld, the accused had been traced.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Arrests, custody
CologneDuring New Year's Eve 2015–16 itself, between 22:00h and 5:00 a.m., near the central railway station, the Cologne police took 11 persons into custody (in Gewahrsam genommen) and arrested (Festnahmen) another four, in relation to various offences. One Cologne policeman stated he had detained eight suspects for various offences that night, all asylum seekers.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Arrests, custody
On 8 January 2016, the Cologne police arrested and took into custody two men suspected of various offences on New Year's Eve, but they were set free within two days for lack of specific suspicions. On 10 January, four named suspects were currently under investigative custody for robbery offences on Cologne's New Year's Eve. On 12 January, five men accused of theft, but not sexual offences, on Cologne's New Year's Eve were in custody. On 14 January, five accused men were still in custody in Cologne. On 18 January, the first suspect of sexual offences in the Cologne New Year's Eve attacks was taken into investigative custody, an Algerian young man living in a refugee shelter 30 km away from Cologne.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Arrests, custody
On 21 January, eight suspects of various offences were under investigative custody in Cologne,  on 29 January this number had risen to ten, on 16 February to 15 suspects. On 18 February, after having been recognised in a police photo by a young woman, one presumed perpetrator of sexual offences in the Cologne New Year's Eve attacks was arrested. After publishing photos of five suspects of sexual harassment on 8 March 2016, the police of Cologne arrested two of them within one day. By 17 March, the Cologne police held 14 people in investigative custody, two of them for sexual offences on New Year's Eve.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Arrests, custody
By 6 April 2016, the Cologne police still held 24 suspects of various offences from New Year's Eve in investigative custody. In late April 2016, the Swiss police arrested another suspect of attacks on women on Cologne's New Year's Eve and extradited him to Germany.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Arrests, custody
FrankfurtOn 11 January 2016, the Frankfurt police said that the first ten arrested suspects of sexual attacks on New Year's Eve 2015–16 in Frankfurt were all refugees.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Arrests, custody
StuttgartOn 17 January 2016, in Stuttgart, an asylum seeker from Iraq was arrested on suspicion of having taken part in a group harassment of two girls on New Year's Eve.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Arrests, custody
HamburgIn Hamburg, in response to photos being published on 20 January 2016 of two suspects of sexual assaults on New Year's Eve, a 29-year-old male migrant from Afghanistan living in a refugee center, was arrested the next day. On 5 February, in response to a surveillance camera photo being published, a 33-year-old man from Iran was subsequently recognized by one of his victims and arrested in a refugee reception center in Hamburg. He was taken into investigative custody under suspicion of assaulting two young women on New Year's Eve.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Arrests, custody
DüsseldorfIn February 2016, an 18-year-old girl from Mönchengladbach who was sexually harassed in Düsseldorf on New Year's Eve recognized her harasser on television, which led to his arrest around 14 February.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Criminal proceedings
GeneralIn July 2016, the Bundeskriminalamt (Federal Criminal Police) noted that nationwide, judicial proceedings against 120 suspects of sexual violence the last New Year's Eve in Germany had been instituted.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Criminal proceedings
CologneOn 8 January 2016, the Cologne police was investigating against 19 suspects of various offences in Cologne on New Year's Eve. On 10 January, the Cologne police was investigating against 19 named suspects of various offences in Cologne on New Year's Eve, all of them were non-Germans, ten were asylum applicants, with nine others presumably illegally in Germany, 14 of them were men from Morocco or Algeria.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Criminal proceedings
On 12 January, the Staatsanwaltschaft (state attorney) was investigating 12 men accused of theft, but not sexual offences, in Cologne. On 14 January, an investigation ran in Cologne against 13 accused of various offences; on 21 January this number had risen to 30. All the accused were North Africans; on 29 January this number had risen to 44, with most of them again being North Africans. On 16 February 2016, an investigation ran in Cologne against 73 suspects of theft, sexual assault, or other offences on New Year's Eve, 60 of them of North African descent.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Criminal proceedings
On 17 March, the Staatsanwaltschaft (state attorney) in Cologne was investigating 120 accused, but at the most two of them were accused of sexual offences. On 25 November 2016, criminal investigations in Cologne had started against 83 suspects of various offences on New Year's Eve.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Criminal proceedings
FrankfurtIn late January 2016, police in Frankfurt were investigating ten men suspected of pickpocketing, but not directly sexual violence, on New Year's Eve near the Eiserner Steg footbridge in the city centre. The accused were all either asylum seekers or refugees.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Criminal proceedings
Eventually, all criminal proceedings in Frankfurt concerning sexual violence on New Year's Eve had to be dismissed due to lack of sufficient substantiated suspicion against specific persons, as declared in September 2016 by a spokesman of the Staatsanwaltschaft (state attorney).


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Criminal proceedings
Düsseldorf By November 2016, in three cases of sexual offences on New Year's Eve in Düsseldorf criminal proceedings had started.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Criminal proceedings
Bielefeld By November 2016, 15 criminal proceedings had started in Bielefeld over various offences on New Year's Eve.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Criminal proceedings
Dortmund By November 2016, five judicial proceedings had started in Dortmund for sexual offences on New Year's Eve.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Convictions, sentences
NationwideAs of July 2016, four men had been convicted for sexual violence on New Year's Eve nationwide in Germany.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Convictions, sentences
CologneIn July 2016, the first two men were convicted in Cologne for sexual assault on New Year's Eve: a 21-year-old Iraqi and a 26-year-old Algerian. They were given suspended one-year sentences. By 25 November 2016, six accused of various offences on Cologne's New Year's Eve had been found guilty. The longest sentence was 1 year and nine months, but it was not yet legally valid since the convict appealed against his sentence. The proceedings against 52 suspects had been stopped.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Convictions, sentences
Düsseldorf By 25 November 2016, in one case for sexual offences on New Year's Eve in Düsseldorf, the accused was sentenced to 1 year and ten months imprisonment; his appeal against that sentence was still ongoing.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Suspects and convictions, Convictions, sentences
Dortmund By 25 November 2016, two accused of sexual offences on New Year's Eve in Dortmund had been convicted. One was sentenced to 25 hours of community service for insults on a sexual basis, the other was fined 1,000 euros for exhibitionism.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Later comparable incidents in Germany, Carnival 2016
The 2016 Carnival celebrations were from Thursday, 4 February, until Tuesday, 9 February. After the first night, 22 sexual offences including two rapes were reported to the Cologne police, whereas the two previous years saw 10 and 9 reports of sexual offences after the first night. The Cologne police director commented that "the readiness to report [such assaults] clearly has changed". Of one of the rapes in Cologne, a 17-year-old asylum seeker from Nigeria living in a residence for refugees was suspected, and he was arrested.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Later comparable incidents in Germany, Carnival 2016
One rape was reported in Schloß Holte-Stukenbrock that first night, attributed to a 29-year-old asylum seeker from Nigeria, and four sexual assaults were reported in Bonn. By the end of the Carnival, a total of 66 complaints of sexual offences had been reported to the police in Cologne. A female reporter covering the Cologne Carnival for Belgian television was groped live on camera by attackers of native European origin.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Alleged sex assaults elsewhere, We Are Sthlm 2014, 2015
At the Stockholm annual music festival for youths between 13 and 19, 'We Are Sthlm', in both 2014 and 2015 the police received reports of sexual harassment from around 15–20 women or girls, often younger than 15 years of age. The police did not publicise those reports, but Sveriges Radio reported about them shortly after the August 2015 festival.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Alleged sex assaults elsewhere, Finland 2015
According to one Helsinki police chief, after the arrival of 32,000 asylum seekers in Finland in 2015, many from Iraq, 14 sexual attacks on streets or in parks in the capital Helsinki occurred up until the following New Year's Eve. According to the Helsinki police chief, such incidents never previously occurred in Finland.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Alleged sex assaults elsewhere, New Year's Eve 2015–16, Finland
On Helsinki's Senate Square (Finland), where 20,000 people had gathered for New Year's Eve 2015–16 celebrations, women had complained to "security personnel" about asylum seekers groping their breasts and unwelcomely kissing them, as the police reported. Three Iraqi asylum seekers were arrested for sexual assaults at the square. In two more sexual assaults, the suspects were also asylum seekers who were taken into custody on the spot, said police.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Alleged sex assaults elsewhere, New Year's Eve 2015–16, Finland
At Helsinki's central railway station, where a crowd of 1,000 mostly Iraqi refugees had converged on New Year's Eve, three sexual assaults were reported to the police.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Alleged sex assaults elsewhere, New Year's Eve 2015–16, Sweden
In the Swedish city of Kalmar, 15 young women reported to the police that they were groped by groups of men on New Year's Eve 2015–16; 11 reports of sexual assault were made. Groups of men reportedly encircled women on a crowded square and groped them. The first two identified suspects in Kalmar were asylum seekers.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Alleged sex assaults elsewhere, New Year's Eve 2015–16, Switzerland
In Zurich, Switzerland, six women reported to the police being surrounded by "dark-skinned men" on New Year's Eve 2015–16 who robbed, groped, and molested them.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Alleged sex assaults elsewhere, New Year's Eve 2015–16, Austria
In Austria, several sex attacks on New Year's Eve 2015–16 were alleged in local news media. One alleged victim of a sex attack in Salzburg related to an Austrian newspaper that while walking with her friends in the historic centre of Salzburg, they were attacked by a group of 10–15 men. One man grabbed one of the girls, put her head into headlock in his jacket, cuddled her, and licked her face. She had to hit and kick the man to free herself.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Care for victims
Hamburg – In Große Freiheit in Hamburg, club bouncers arranged a protection zone in a backyard for the sexually offended women in the New Year's Eve 2015–16.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Care for victims
Stuttgart – In at least one case passersby and a club bouncer came to the rescue of sexually harassed women in Stuttgart on New Year's Eve 2015–16, causing the offenders to flee.


2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany, Care for victims
Dortmund – In one of the sexual harassment incidents in Dortmund on New Year's Eve 2015–16, witnesses intervened, enabling the two harassed women to escape.


2015–16 New York Islanders season
The 2015–16 New York Islanders season was the 44th season in the franchise's history. This season was the team's first at Barclays Center in Brooklyn, one of the five boroughs of New York City, which it shares with the Brooklyn Nets of the National Basketball Association (NBA).


2015–16 New York Islanders season
The team's regular season began on October 9, 2015, against the Chicago Blackhawks.


2015–16 New York Islanders season
The Islanders qualified for the 2016 Stanley Cup playoffs after finishing the season in fourth place in the Metropolitan Division and fifth in the Eastern Conference with 100 points. The playoff berth was the team's third post-season berth in four seasons, having qualified in 2012–13 and 2014–15, but not in 2013–14. The Islanders' first round matchup had them up against the champions of the Atlantic Division, the Florida Panthers. The Islanders won the series in 6 games on a John Tavares goal in double overtime, marking the team's first playoff series victory since 1993. The Islanders' second round matchup had them matched up against the Tampa Bay Lightning, in which they lost the series in 5 games.


2015–16 New York Islanders season, Schedule and results, Pre-season
– indicates split-squad game. – game to be played at PPL Center in Allentown, Pennsylvania. – game to be played at Scotiabank Centre in Halifax, Nova Scotia.


2015–16 New York Islanders season, Schedule and results, Regular season
Legend:  Win (2 points)  Loss (0 points)  Overtime/shootout loss (1 point)


2015–16 New York Islanders season, Player statistics
†Denotes player spent time with another team before joining the Islanders. Stats reflect time with the Islanders only. ‡Denotes player was traded mid-season. Stats reflect time with the Islanders only. Bold/italics denotes franchise record.


2015–16 New York Islanders season, Transactions
Following the end of the Islanders' 2014–15 season, and during the 2015–16 season, this team has been involved in the following transactions:


2015–16 New York Islanders season, Draft picks
Below are the New York Islanders' selections at the 2015 NHL Entry Draft, to be held on June 26–27, 2015 at the BB&T Center in Sunrise, Florida.


2015–16 New York Islanders season, Draft picks
The New York Rangers' first-round pick went to the New York Islanders as the result of a trade on June 26, 2015 that sent Edmonton's second-round pick in 2015 (33rd overall) and Florida's third-round pick in 2015 (72nd overall) to Tampa Bay in exchange for  this pick.


2015–16 New York Knicks season
The 2015–16 New York Knicks season was the 70th season of the franchise in the National Basketball Association (NBA).


2015–16 New York Knicks season
The season is notable when Kristaps Porzingis gained national attention when he was booed after being drafted fourth overall in the 2015 NBA Draft.


2015–16 New York Knicks season
Derek Fisher in just his second season as Knicks head coach was fired on February 8, 2016 and assistant coach Kurt Rambis took over for the rest of the season.


2015–16 New York Knicks season, Draft
With their sole selection in the 2015 NBA Draft, the New York Knicks selected the originally labelled 7'1" (later revealed to actually be 7'3") power forward/center from Latvia named Kristaps Porziņģis. At the time of his selection, the crowd supporting the team had greeted him with boos and jeers against him, with Stephen A. Smith originally expressing doubts and concerns with this selection.


2015–16 New York Knicks season, Draft
However, months after his selection, Porziņģis became an immediate star player for the Knicks, growing a huge crowd of support for himself the further the season went on, with even Stephen A. Smith changing his original stance on his later on in the season. Porziņģis would end the season with winning each Eastern Conference Rookie of the Month Award, as well as earning easy support for an NBA All-Rookie First Team spot. He was also considered the runner-up for the NBA Rookie of the Year Award, falling just short of that draft year's #1 pick, Karl-Anthony Towns.


2015–16 New York Rangers season
The 2015–16 New York Rangers season was the franchise's 89th season of play and their 90th season overall. The season began its regular games on October 7, 2015 against the Chicago Blackhawks.


2015–16 New York Rangers season, Schedule and results, Regular season
Win (2 Points)  Loss (0 points)  Overtime/shootout loss (1 point)


2015–16 New York Rangers season, Playoffs
The Rangers qualified for the playoffs for the sixth consecutive season, entering as the 4th seed in the Eastern Conference and being matched up against the Pittsburgh Penguins.


2015–16 New York Rangers season, Player statistics
†Denotes player spent time with another team before joining the Rangers. Stats reflect time with the Rangers only. ‡Denotes player was traded mid-season. Stats reflect time with the Rangers only. Bold/italics denotes franchise record.


2015–16 New York Rangers season, Transactions
The Rangers were been involved in the following transactions during the 2015–16 season:


2015–16 New York Rangers season, Draft picks
Below are the New York Rangers' selections at the 2015 NHL Entry Draft, held on June 26–27, 2015 at the BB&T Center in Sunrise, Florida.


2015–16 New York Riveters season
The 2015–16 New York Riveters season was the first in franchise history and the National Women's Hockey League's inaugural season.


2015–16 New York Riveters season, Offseason, Spring free agent camp
During May 2015, all four teams held player evaluation camps for free agents. The list of players that attended the Riveters evaluation camp on May 23 and 24 were split into Team Red and Team White.


2015–16 New York Riveters season, Statistics, Goaltenders
†Denotes player spent time with another team before joining the Riveters. Stats reflect time with the Riveters only. ‡Denotes player was traded mid-season. Stats reflect time with the Riveters only.


2015–16 New York Riveters season, Draft
The following were the Riveters selections in the 2015 NWHL Draft on June 20, 2015.


2015–16 New Zealand Football Championship
The 2015–16 New Zealand Football Championship season (currently known as the ASB Premiership  for sponsorship reasons) is the twelfth season of the NZFC since its establishment in 2004. Eight teams are involved this season, after Wanderers SC withdrew from the competition. Auckland City and Team Wellington will represent the ASB Premiership in the 2016 OFC Champions League after finishing Champions and Runners-up respectively in the 2014–15 competition.


2015–16 New Zealand Football Championship, Regular season, Fixtures and results
The 2015–16 season sees every team play the other both home and away. Due to Auckland City's participation in the 2015 FIFA Club World Cup, several matches have been rescheduled.


2015–16 New Zealand Women's One-Day Competition
The 2015–16 New Zealand Women's One-Day Competition was a 50-over women's cricket competition that took place in New Zealand. It ran from November 2015 to February 2016, with 6 provincial teams taking part. Auckland Hearts beat Wellington Blaze in the final to win the competition, their second 50-over title in two years.


2015–16 New Zealand Women's One-Day Competition
The tournament ran alongside the 2015–16 New Zealand Women's Twenty20 Competition.


2015–16 New Zealand Women's One-Day Competition, Competition format
Teams played in a double round-robin in a group of six, therefore playing 10 matches overall. Matches were played using a one day format with 50 overs per side. The top two in the group advanced to the final.


2015–16 New Zealand Women's One-Day Competition, Competition format
The group worked on a points system with positions being based on the total points. Points were awarded as follows:


2015–16 New Zealand Women's One-Day Competition, Competition format
Win: 4 pointsTie: 2 pointsLoss: 0 points. Abandoned/No Result: 2 points. Bonus Point: 1 point awarded for run rate in a match being 1.25x that of opponent.


2015–16 New Zealand Women's Twenty20 Competition
The 2015–16 New Zealand Women's Twenty20 Competition was the ninth season of the women's Twenty20 cricket competition played in New Zealand. It ran from November 2015 to February 2016, with 6 provincial teams taking part. Canterbury Magicians beat Central Hinds in the final to win the tournament, their fourth Twenty20 title.


2015–16 New Zealand Women's Twenty20 Competition
The tournament ran alongside the 2015–16 New Zealand Women's One-Day Competition.


2015–16 New Zealand Women's Twenty20 Competition, Competition format
Teams played in a round-robin in a group of six,  playing 5 matches overall. Matches were played using a Twenty20 format. The top two in the group advanced to the final.


2015–16 New Zealand Women's Twenty20 Competition, Competition format
The group worked on a points system with positions being based on the total points. Points were awarded as follows:


2015–16 New Zealand Women's Twenty20 Competition, Competition format
Win: 4 pointsTie: 2 pointsLoss: 0 points. Abandoned/No Result: 2 points.


2015–16 Newcastle Jets FC season
The 2015–16 Newcastle Jets FC season was the club's 15th season since its establishment in 2000. The club participated in the A-League for the 11th time and the FFA Cup for the second time.


2015–16 Newcastle Jets FC season, Players, Squad information
Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.


2015–16 Newcastle United F.C. season
The 2015–16 season was Newcastle United's sixth consecutive season in the Premier League and their 123rd year in existence. This season, Newcastle United participated in the Premier League, FA Cup and League Cup. The season covers the period from 1 July 2015 to 30 June 2016.


2015–16 Newcastle United F.C. season, Season overview
24 May 2015: Newcastle United guarantee participation in the 2015–16 Premier League by beating West Ham United 2–0 in the final match of the 2014–15 Premier League season.


2015–16 Newcastle United F.C. season, Season overview
4 June 2015: Newcastle United announce their pre-season schedule for 10 July to 1 August 2015, consisting of matches against near-neighbours Gateshead, a tour to the United States to face Mexican side Atlas and United Soccer League sides Sacramento Republic and Portland Timbers 2, as well as matches against Sheffield United, York City and German side Borussia Mönchengladbach upon returning to England.


2015–16 Newcastle United F.C. season, Season overview
10 June 2015: Newcastle United sack coaches John Carver and Steve Stone prior to the 2015–16 season. Former England manager Steve McClaren is appointed the club's new head coach on a three-year deal, with an option to extend to eight years. McClaren is also appointed to the Newcastle United Board of Directors, along with chief scout Graham Carr and club ambassador Bob Moncur. Mike Ashley and John Irving both step down from the Board of Directors, with managing director Lee Charnley the only person to remain on the Board.