Frankfurt shops looted as left-wing extremists hijack Germany's Gen-Z protests

Stores on Frankfurt's Zeil shopping street were ransacked on Saturday evening after extremists embedded themselves in Germany's Gen-Z protest movement, turning a day of largely peaceful demonstrations into scenes of disorder across several cities.

Hessian Interior Minister Roman Poseck said roughly 100 left-wing extremists had infiltrated the marches and mounted sustained attacks on police, hurling bottles, stones and pyrotechnics. Officers were injured in Frankfurt and the Zeil was sealed off. Attackers smashed shop windows, stolen goods included trainers and other merchandise, and a weapons shop was targeted — with police subsequently securing two weapons from inside.

Frankfurt police recorded "numerous arrests" through the day and evening; exact figures were not available at the time of reporting.

In Berlin, 27 officers were lightly injured during clashes that broke out at a separate assembly of up to 3,500 people at Rosenthaler Platz in Mitte. The main Gen-Z rally at Brandenburg Gate, which drew up to 5,000 participants, passed off largely without incident, a police spokesman said.

In Cologne, disorder spread around the cathedral and central station before other groups pushed into the Südstadt district.

The afternoon marches had called for better education, fairer distribution of public burdens and opposition to compulsory military service. The organising group "Gen Z regelt" had explicitly called for non-violent protest. ARD reporting indicated the evening attackers were distinct from the demonstration crowds, acting in small dispersed groups that made police containment difficult.

Poseck said he had "repeatedly pointed out that we had to expect left-wing extremist violence" to mix into the demonstration, and that is what happened.