The leafy market square, ringed by Middle Eastern restaurants in a quiet city where nearly half the residents have immigrant backgrounds, seems like the last place that would spur Germany’s latest explosive wave of nationalist backlash.
But it was in Mannheim where prosecutors say an Afghan man stabbed six people in May at an anti-Islamist rally, killing an officer who had intervened.
But the death and the fact that the man accused had his asylum claim denied years ago set off calls for the expulsion of some refugees.
It has been particularly painful for the longtime Muslim population of the city, where, according to some estimates, nearly one in five people are of Turkish descent.
That worry has heightened since January, when an exposé revealed a secret meeting by members of the extreme right during which the deportation of even legal residents of immigrant descent was discussed.
Locations:
Mannheim, Germany