 Bundesbank official Thilo Sarrazin is facing increasing pressure from across the political spectrum due to his controversial views on Muslims and immigrants, as calls grew for him to leave the Social Democrats (SPD) and his Bundesbank post.
Politicians joined in the chorus of outrage over Sarrazin’s recent comments regarding foreigners in a new book he has written and which are widely seen as inflammatory and xenophobic.
In an excerpt from his book published by daily Bild, Sarrazin said there were “good grounds” for reservations against Muslims across Europe.
“There is no other religion with such a flowing transition to violence, dictatorship, and terrorism,” he claimed, before making the equally provocative assertion that Muslim immigrants were “associated with taking advantage of social welfare state and criminality.”
Sarrazin sparked further outrage when he told Welt am Sonn-tag in an interview that races were distinguished by a particular gene such as “a Jewish gene.”
Justice Minister Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger of the FDP party called Sarrazin’s theories “confused and unbearable.”
“Germany is a country of immigration and we can be proud of the liberal values and openness of our society,” she said.
Sarrazin’s new book, called ‘Deutschland schafft sich ab – Wie wir unser Land aufs Spiel setzen’, or ‘Abolishing Germany – How we’re putting our country in jeopardy,’ was released this week.
In the book, Sarrazin warns that Germans could become “strangers in their own country” because of integration.
This is not the first time Sarrazin has sparked controversy with his views. In September last year he made anti-immigrant remarks against Arabs and Turks in an interview with Lettre International magazine.
He claimed that “a great many Arabs and Turks in [Berlin], whose numbers have grown because of the wrong policies, have no productive function other than as fruit and vegetable grocers.”
Though he apologised for those remarks, Sarrazin refused to step down from the Bundesbank’s board despite pressure to do so.
He was however symbolically punished when the institution stripped him of some responsibilities after the incident, which caused widespread outrage.
In a statement issued late on Monday, the Bundesbank said it “distances itself categorically from discriminatory remarks” made by Sarrazin but remained vague on whether it would sack him.
“The Executive Board of the Deutsche Bundesbank will immediately conduct a discussion with Dr Sarrazin, give him a hearing and take prompt further action,” it said.
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