Wolfgang Albers © Oliver Berg
NRW Interior Minister Ralf Jager © Monika Skolimowska
The police's handling of the assaults against women on New Year's Eve in Cologne has personnel consequences: Cologne police chief Wolfgang Albers was put into temporary retirement on Friday.
North Rhine-Westphalia's Interior Minister Ralf Jager took this measure, as several media reported unanimously. Jager wanted to restore public confidence and the ability of the Cologne police to act, it was said. He had informed Albers of this development on Friday afternoon. The minister planned to comment on the move to the press this afternoon.
Albers criticized for information policy
Albers had been heavily criticized in recent days for the apparent overstretching of the police on New Year's Eve and for the subsequent information policy. An internal report made public on Thursday had made clear the extent of sexual assaults on women and other crimes. Groups of young men, apparently mainly from the North African-Arab region, had sexually harassed and stolen from numerous women in front of Cologne's main train station on New Year's Eve. So far, 170 reports have been filed.
Police had failed to prevent the attacks, which were committed from a crowd of at times more than a thousand people. The internal report by a senior official, published by several media outlets, says, among other things, that far too few police officers have been deployed. In recent days, Albers has been accused, among other things, that details about the events on New Year's Eve only came to the public in bits and pieces.