https://feeds.thelocal.com/ Read the latest news and views from Germany in English en-us news@thelocal.com (TheLocal) webmaster@thelocal.com (TheLocal) TheLocal RSS Feed Barbara Pönisch spends most of her days at work doing puzzles -- piecing together a mountain of documents torn up by the hated East German Stasi secret police. https://www.thelocal.de/20191105/german-puzzlers-reconstruct-stasi-files-from-millions-of-fragments Tue, 05 Nov 2019 09:57:58 +0100 german-puzzlers-reconstruct-stasi-files-from-millions-of-fragments As the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall approaches, David Courbet hears the story of a tunnel digger who risked his life for others and was saved by an unlikely 'hero'. https://www.thelocal.de/20191101/berlin-wall-30-years-on-how-a-stasi-hero-saved-tunnel-diggers-life Fri, 01 Nov 2019 09:47:38 +0100 berlin-wall-30-years-on-how-a-stasi-hero-saved-tunnel-diggers-life Nearly 30 years after the Berlin Wall fell, Germany's parliament voted Thursday to transfer the vast secret police files of the former East German communist regime into the Federal Archives -- despite concerns voiced by some historians and ex-dissidents. https://www.thelocal.de/20190927/a-lid-will-be-put-on-history-stasi-archive Fri, 27 Sep 2019 11:29:11 +0200 a-lid-will-be-put-on-history-stasi-archive Deputies will vote on whether to integrate the Stasi records and its 111 kilometres of files collected by the hated secret police into the Federal Archives. https://www.thelocal.de/20190926/30-years-on-german-mps-to-decide-fate-of-vast-stasi-archive Thu, 26 Sep 2019 16:02:18 +0200 30-years-on-german-mps-to-decide-fate-of-vast-stasi-archive The little known tragedy of the 1969 rumoured Rolling Stones concert captures both the East Germans’ determination for freedom of expression, and the horrors of life under the Stasi. https://www.thelocal.de/20190912/rolling-stones-concert-east-germany Thu, 12 Sep 2019 12:41:59 +0200 rolling-stones-concert-east-germany More than 30 years after the Lockerbie bombing, German prosecutors confirmed Thursday they have interviewed ex-East German secret police agents, at the request of Scottish investigators, over the attack. https://www.thelocal.de/20190321/former-east-german-stasi-agents-questioned-over-lockerbie-bombing Thu, 21 Mar 2019 15:00:58 +0100 former-east-german-stasi-agents-questioned-over-lockerbie-bombing Chancellor Angela Merkel on Friday inaugurated the new, fortress-like Berlin headquarters of Germany's scandal-plagued BND foreign intelligence service. https://www.thelocal.de/20190208/merkel-opens-spy-agencys-massive-new-berlin-hq Fri, 08 Feb 2019 15:17:13 +0100 merkel-opens-spy-agencys-massive-new-berlin-hq Exactly 69 years ago, on February 8th, 1950, the fledgling German Democratic Republic(GDR) officially debuted its security service, dedicated to monitoring and preventing outside influences - particularly from the West. https://www.thelocal.de/20190208/what-the-stasi-show-about-an-unforgotten-era-of-mass-surveillance Fri, 08 Feb 2019 12:29:41 +0100 what-the-stasi-show-about-an-unforgotten-era-of-mass-surveillance A Stasi ID card belonging to Russian president Vladimir Putin has been coincidentally found in a Dresden archive, German media reported Tuesday. https://www.thelocal.de/20181211/putins-stasi-id-card-found-in-dresden-archive Tue, 11 Dec 2018 17:31:29 +0100 putins-stasi-id-card-found-in-dresden-archive A Cold War hangover was played out in a Copenhagen court room on Monday. https://www.thelocal.de/20180130/germany-danish-former-stasi-collaborator-sues-historian-for-libel Tue, 30 Jan 2018 12:54:29 +0100 germany-danish-former-stasi-collaborator-sues-historian-for-libel The mayor of Berlin announced on Saturday that a senior regional official had been fired for having worked in the Stasi, the former East Germany's dreaded secret police. https://www.thelocal.de/20170115/berlin-mayor-fires-housing-chief-for-stasi-past Sun, 15 Jan 2017 09:00:08 +0100 berlin-mayor-fires-housing-chief-for-stasi-past Berlin has opened a shelter at the former headquarters of communist East Germany's feared Stasi secret police to help house a record influx of asylum seekers, weekend media reports said. https://www.thelocal.de/20151122/germany-to-house-refugees-in-stasi-hq Sun, 22 Nov 2015 15:17:41 +0100 germany-to-house-refugees-in-stasi-hq Germany's very first museum of spying is set to open in Berlin on Saturday in a tribute to the history of the "Capital City of Espionage". https://www.thelocal.de/20150917/berlin-museum-welcomes-spies-in-from-cold Thu, 17 Sep 2015 20:00:14 +0200 berlin-museum-welcomes-spies-in-from-cold While "Deutschland 83" gets its permiere as a mini-series at Berlinale on Tuesday and Wednesday, it also makes entertainment history as being the first German series to be broadcast for American audiences. https://www.thelocal.de/20150210/east-west-spy-drama-to-get-american-debut Tue, 10 Feb 2015 08:55:00 +0100 east-west-spy-drama-to-get-american-debut The Stasi Records Office has made selected records from the infamous East German secret police force available online. https://www.thelocal.de/20150109/stasi-documents-trove-released-online Fri, 09 Jan 2015 09:00:00 +0100 stasi-documents-trove-released-online 25 years ago today, just weeks after the fall of the Berlin Wall, hundreds of ordinary people stormed into Stasi offices in Erfurt to stop the repressive secret police destroying the records it kept on East Germans. https://www.thelocal.de/20141204/how-ordinary-people-smashed-the-stasi Thu, 04 Dec 2014 16:00:00 +0100 how-ordinary-people-smashed-the-stasi A former Stasi prisoner turned Communist spy has won the right to appeal against a decision to take his pension and compensation money away from him. https://www.thelocal.de/20140124/east-german-stasi-prisoner-turned-spy-wins-pension-appeal-case Fri, 24 Jan 2014 16:50:00 +0100 east-german-stasi-prisoner-turned-spy-wins-pension-appeal-case Berlin police are investigating whether an artist who projected “United Stasi of America" onto the US embassy in the German capital earlier this week could be charged with a criminal offence. https://www.thelocal.de/20130711/50803 Thu, 11 Jul 2013 13:51:00 +0200 50803 Chancellor Angela Merkel has rejected comparisons between US government spying and the secret police of the former East Germany. In an interview she defends the German secret service, as well as the practice of intercepting data. https://www.thelocal.de/20130710/50793 Wed, 10 Jul 2013 19:29:00 +0200 50793 Former victims of East Germany's spying apparatus and a state informant recount their dark memories in a play that, more than two decades after the collapse of the communist regime, aims to exorcise the ghosts of the feared Stasi secret police. AFP's Eloi Rouyer reports. https://www.thelocal.de/20130527/49947 Mon, 27 May 2013 16:49:00 +0200 49947