Alarming increase in extreme acts: Austria's security in danger!

Alarming increase in extreme acts: Austria's security in danger!

Österreich - The security situation in Austria intensified in 2024. This emerges from the current constitutional protection report, which was presented on Monday morning by Interior Minister Gerhard Karner, State Secretary Jörg Leichtfried and DSN director Omar Haijawi-Pirchner. According to the report, there was an alarming increase in extremist acts, especially in the area of Islamist extremism.

The cases recorded in Islamist extremism rose by more than 40 percent to a total of 215 acts, while the area of right -wing extremism with 1,486 registered deeds recorded the most ads. There was an increase of 23 percent, especially in the case of assault offenses and property damage. Left-wing extremist crimes also increased by 120 percent to 214 crime, often due to the protests in connection with the Gaza conflict.

rising threats and networked dangers

The Directorate State Protection and Intelligence (DSN) identifies four central risk areas: Islamist extremism, right-wing and left-wing extremism, espionage and disinformation. Karner emphasized that the security situation in Europe and Austria had changed a lot, especially after Hamas's attack on Israel in October 2023. This change led to an increased networking of the threats.

In the period since this incident, the security authorities were able to prevent eight attack plans that can be assigned to Islamist extremism. Planned attack goals included both public transport nodes and religious places. The increasing radicalization, especially young people about social media, is considered particularly worrying. Radicalization processes on the Internet have more than doubled since 2022, a fact that is directly due to the offensive of groups such as the Islamists.

prevention measures and security policy requirements

The political reactions to the report are different. While the government's FPÖ accuses the security situation of the government, Greens and NEOS require increased deradicalization work and a clear age limit in social media. The terrorist warning level remains "high", which underlines the continued threat situation. In this context, the imperative is that security authorities continue to modernize their resources and technological skills in order to counteract the new threats.

Overall, the constitutional protection report shows that extremism in Austria is an increasingly complex and networked problem that requires a determined and coordinated action to protect society. Further details can be found in the corresponding reports of [kosmo.at] (https://www.kosmo.at/40-pren- Mehr-ertror-tätungen-extremism-bericht-erschuetert/), Exxpress.at and orf.at.