No doubt many readers of this blog have seen the fabulous film Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others) which won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. The film shows in great detail the techniques used by the Secret Police (Stasi) in its obsessive surveillance of citizens in East Germany.
Well, it appears that many of these same techniques are being employed now in the surveillance of the protesters of the G-8 summit. According to Der Spiegel, the police are opening the mail of suspected protesters, installing hidden cameras in internet cafes, and staking out drug stores know to be frequented by anti-globalization protest leaders.
The federal prosecutor Monika Harms defended the heavy-handed tactics:
"Nur weil eine Methode von der Stasi in ganz anderem Zusammenhang eingesetzt wurde, heißt das noch nicht, dass sie für uns schon deswegen tabu ist."
(Just because a method used by the Stasi is being employed in a completely different context doesn’t mean it’s tabu for us.)
(HT: Quirinus)
