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The German federal police are expanding its anti-terrorism unit GSG 9 and installing a special squad in Berlin. The move is a reaction to ongoing terrorist threats in the capital. The federal police squad that deals with terrorist attacks is to become significantly larger, and will set up a second base in Berlin. “We’re talking about around a third of the current strength of the unit,” GSG 9 commander Jérome Fuchs told Berlin state broadcaster RBB on Monday, before adding that finding the right personnel would be a “big challenge,” and that “fitness, strength of character, and teamwork” were particular...

The Interior Ministry is planning to beef up its terror response capacity by setting up an new elite unit to be deployed in emergency situations, on top of Germany’s existing GSG 9. The government is taking the step as a response to the recent terror attacks in France and Denmark, believing that Germany’s current reaction capacity is too limited, reports Der Spiegel. Germany needs “a robust unit that can confront such situations,” said the Christian Democrat (CDU) specialist for the interior, Armin Schuster. …

Berlin welcomes Bush's Iraq stance; diplomats to stay 14 April 2004 BERLIN - The German government Wednesday welcomed comments by US President George W. Bush on Iraq and said it had no plans to withdraw diplomats from Baghdad despite the killing of two German police guards earlier this week. Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's deputy spokesman, Thomas Steg, said Berlin strongly supported several aspects raised by Bush during a news conference on Tuesday. "The president made some important points," said Steg. Schroeder welcomes the US decision to hold firm to the 30 June deadline for handing over power to a transitional Iraqi...

BERLIN, April 12 (Reuters) - German aid organisations evacuated their last four workers from Iraq on Monday due to the deteriorating security situation, a spokesman for one of the groups said. The government said two embassy guards feared killed in an ambush last week remained missing. A spokesman for the "Aktion Deutschland Hilft" said the last four members of a 10-person team removing munitions from residential areas left Baghdad on a U.N. aircraft for Amman. He said they hoped to return to Baghdad as soon as possible. The Foreign Ministry said the two elite anti-terror security specialists headed to the...

BERLIN - The Foreign Ministry on Monday warned Germans to leave Iraq after two security officials were ambushed and presumed to be dead. The ministry also warned against travel to Kuwait, where it said there is also a "high security risk." Fighting has been heavy in Iraq for the past week, and several civilians have either been kidnapped or killed. Aktion Deutschland Hilft, the umbrella organization for German humanitarian aid groups, said the six Germans who had been in Iraq working on projects pulled out over the weekend, with the final two reaching Amman, Jordan, on Monday. Two security agents...

BERLIN: Germany said Sunday that two elite policemen missing in Iraq were probably dead, after a British newspaper said the pair were killed in a gunfire fight with Iraqi rebels near the flashpoint town of Fallujah. There is a "strong probability" that the two men are dead, a German foreign ministry spokesman said. A journalist with Britain's The Sunday Telegraph in Fallujah, where Sunni Muslim insurgents have been locked in fierce fighting with US-led occupation forces, said he had seen the bullet-riddled bodies of the Germans. Journalist Lee Gordon said he was told that the Germans had been traveling last...

The Iraqi rebels show me their latest victim: a German in a pool of blood By Lee Gordon (Filed: 11/04/2004) A young Iraqi mujahideen fighter poses in triumph by the smouldering wreck, his face obscured by a red and white kaffiyeh scarf, his high-powered sniper's rifle ready for action. It is only minutes since a white Japanese 4x4 vehicle was forced off the road and its two occupants, both German, killed in a firefight and their bodies dragged from the vehicle when it burst into flames. Now, a mile away, I have been brought to the scene of their deaths...

This breaking news item was put up on "Spiegel" about 6:30 AM EDT. Two members of the crack German Anti-terrorist Unit GSG-9 are missing after an ambush on a convoy going to Baghdad from Amman, Jordan last Wednesday. There have been no indications of a kidnapping thus far. The attack occured near Fallujah. Vehicles that escaped the ambush reached the embassy later. "Spiegel-Online"....Zwei deutsche GSG-9-Mitarbeiter im Irak vermisst longjack

BERLIN (AFP) - Two German government security workers have been missing in Iraq (news - web sites) for several days, the German foreign ministry told AFP. "Two civil servants working for the German mission in Baghdad have been missing for the past few days," a ministry spokeswowan said Saturday, confirming earlier television reports. "There is no evidence to suggest it is a hostage-taking."