Germany sees record surge in politically motivated crimes in 2025

Germany reported a record 85,837 politically motivated crimes in 2025, with far-right offenses – including hate crimes and violent attacks – making up roughly half of the total, the Interior Ministry said on Tuesday.

Neo-Nazis and right-wing extremists committed 42,544 such crimes, according to the ministry’s figures. That included 8,396 xenophobic hate crimes and 4,138 verbal or physical attacks targeting religious communities, including both Islamophobic and antisemitic incidents.

Violent attacks by right-wing extremists reached their highest level since 2017. They carried out 1,598 violent assaults on migrants, refugees and political opponents – a rise of more than 7% from the previous year – injuring at least 1,146 people.

Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt described the overall figures as a record high and said right-wing extremism remains the dominant threat.

“By far the highest number of offenses were committed by right-wing and far-right extremists, demonstrating once again that the greatest danger currently stems from right-wing extremism,” Dobrindt told a press conference in Berlin.

He also expressed concern about rising left-wing radicalization. Left-wing extremists committed 13,490 crimes last year, a more than 35% increase from the previous year, the ministry said. The figures also recorded 6,886 crimes by followers of extremist foreign groups and 1,983 by those motivated by extremist religious ideologies.