Pro-Russia protesters in Germany demand end to discrimination against them

FRANKFURT • Pro-Russia protesters rallied in Germany on Sunday, with the country's significant Russian-speaking population demanding an end to the discrimination it says it has suffered since war began in Ukraine.

Germany is home to 1.2 million people of Russian origin and 325,000 from Ukraine. The authorities fear the conflict could be imported to Germany and the protests used to promote Moscow's war narrative.

Police have recorded 383 anti-Russian offences and 181 anti-Ukrainian offences since the Kremlin's invasion started on Feb 24.

About 800 people descended on financial hub Frankfurt on Sunday, police said, amid a sea of Russian flags to protest "against hatred and harassment", said an Agence France-Presse (AFP) journalist. There was a heavy police presence.

The protesters were outnumbered by 2,500 people taking part in a counter-demonstration in support of Ukraine.

"I came here because I support peace," protester Ozan Yilmaz, 24, told AFP. "Children are beaten at school because they speak Russian, that's not acceptable."

Another protester, 25-year-old Sebastian, was also in the pro-Russia crowd. "The war didn't start this year," he said. "It has been going on since 2014 and so I find that speaking of an attack" against Ukraine by Russia is "not really appropriate".

Police threw up a large cordon to separate the protesters from the pro-Ukraine demonstration near the city's central banking district.

Ukraine's Ambassador to Germany, Mr Andriy Melnyk, strongly opposed the green light given by the German authorities to the protests, describing it as a "huge shame" for the country.

About 600 demonstrators staged a car convoy in the northern city of Hanover following an appeal by the Russian-speaking community, police told AFP, while 200 people took part in a rally in Osnabruck, north-west Germany.

Meanwhile, many Russians in Poland have spent the past seven weeks joining grassroots efforts to provide housing, logistical support and other types of aid to those fleeing the war.

One of them, who wanted to be identified only as Mr Evgeny, has since the beginning of last month packed his car every week with boxes of medicine and driven from his home near Krakow to another Polish city, Rzeszow, near the border with Ukraine.

"For me, it's simple. It's not an internal conflict for me," said Mr Evgeny of reconciling his Russian identity - and concerns for family still living in Russia - with his desire to help Ukrainians. "I do not treat it like two opposing sides, as if my family is an enemy of the other side."

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, NYTIMES