Berlin: Three asylum seekers from Pakistan were arrested in Germany following 18 complaints of sexual assault from women who attended a music festival in the city over the weekend.
Initially, three women had filed charges, leading to the arrests of the three men, Pakistani asylum seekers aged 28 to 31, and another 15 women have come forward since, according to news agency AFP.
Complainants, of whom most are young women, said they were encircled and groped by groups of men on Saturday night.
Police said they were investigating whether the perpetrators also robbed the women in the latest attacks at a four-day open air music festival in the western city of Darmstadt where around 100,000 people were in the crowds. All the accused have been charged with sexual crimes as the hunt continues for their accomplices.
By Tuesday afternoon, more women had made complaints of being sexually assaulted at the festival, describing a similar pattern to the assaults and also that the men appeared to come from south Asia.
The recent attacks were a grim reminder of infamous mob attacks at chaotic New Year’s festivities in Cologne.
The Cologne attacks ─ committed in a crowd of mostly Arabic and North African men ─ appalled Germany and sharpened public concern about the arrival of over one million mostly asylum seekers last year, most from the Middle East.
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