At the end of a procedure which made waves, for the first time since the war, a soldier, member of the extreme right, was tried for having fomented attacks against senior officials. Ex-lieutenant Franco Albrecht was sentenced in Frankfurt to five and a half years in prison.
With our correspondent in Berlin, Pascal Thibault
He had posed as a Syrian refugee and was accused of plotting attacks against left-wing politicians. The affair around the lieutenant of the Bundeswehr, Franco Albrecht, had splashed the German army, but also the immigration services which had recognized in the far-right soldier a refugee.
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During his trial, Franco Albrecht had regretted having fooled the immigration services, but denied the preparation of attacks and his membership of the extreme right. But the possession of illegal weapons, many cats, academic work with radical theses leave little doubt about the profile of the soldier. During his trial, during which he was not incarcerated at the time, he was arrested while carrying Nazi decorations.
Franco Albrecht was sentenced on Friday July 15 to five and a half years in prison and was found guilty of planning a serious act of violence threatening state security. The prosecution presented him as a “ far-right terrorist “. It is the first time since the end of the Second World War that a member of the German army has been condemned for having fomented an attack.