A former karate teacher and chef who proclaimed himself King of Germany has been arrested and his group, the “Kingdom of Germany”, outlawed for trying to set up a separate state with its own bank, health insurance service, police force, court system and currency.
Peter Fitzek, 59, ran the largest group within Germany’s far-right Reich Citizens scene which refuses to recognise the postwar republic and strives to restore the nation to its prewar borders. Video footage of his “coronation” shows him dressed in a red cloak lined with white fur declaring the aim to give Germany “a homeland in true freedom”.
He and three other men were arrested on Tuesday when 800 police raided properties linked to the Kingdom of Germany in seven states from Baden-Württemberg in the southwest to Thuringia in the east. They face charges of forming a criminal organisation and conducting illegal banking and insurance businesses.
Fitzek has a number of previous convictions including for assault and insulting behaviour
JENS SCHLUETER/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES
Alexander Dobrindt, the interior minister, called the ban a “significant blow” against the Reich Citizens, which came to global prominence in 2022 when investigators uncovered an alleged coup plot by a different group within the movement, the Patriotic Union, led by the aristocrat Heinrich XIII Prince Reuss.
Dobrindt said the Kingdom of Germany claimed to have 6,000 members but that the true figure was believed to be 1,000. No weapons were found in the raids but that was to be expected because its alleged crimes were economic rather than violent, he said.
Police searched a total of 14 properties including the homes of leading members. Evidence was confiscated and the association’s considerable assets have been seized.
The group raised “substantial” funds from members’ donations and formed sub-organisations such as the so-called Royal Reichsbank as well as a welfare insurance provider called Deutsche Heilfürsorge, the interior ministry said.
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Fitzek proclaimed his kingdom on the grounds of a former hospital in Wittenberg in 2012 and became active around Germany, dispatching speakers to conferences and buying up land and property. It was also given property by members and sympathisers to enlarge the territory of the “kingdom”.
The group bought a country estate in Bärwalde, Saxony, in 2022, as well as a vacant hotel in Lower Saxony. It invested €6 million in a former farm in Halsbrücke, Saxony — about 40km from Dresden — including a quarry, cheese dairy and holiday apartments. Halsbrücke has become the group’s base and Fitzek was arrested there on Tuesday.
He has a number of previous convictions including for assault and insulting behaviour after kicking a female court employee and calling two soldiers who came to her aid “fascist pigs”. He has also been convicted of driving without a valid driving licence, because the Kingdom issues its own licences.
“I say expressly that this is not about harmless nostalgics, as the title of the organisation might suggest, but about criminal structures and a criminal network,” Dobrindt said.
The headquarters of the Kingdom of Germany in Halsbrücke, Saxony
ANNEGRET HILSE/REUTERS
The ministry said the group disparaged state institutions in Germany and other countries. “They are portrayed as being satanically undermined and steered by Jewish clans. The ongoing propagation of such narratives violates the human dignity of Jews and delegitimises state institutions in an unconstitutional manner,” it said.
The organisation had continued to violate German banking and insurance laws for years despite attempts by the Federal Financial Supervisory Authority to stop it, the ministry said.
The Kingdom of Germany is the latest group to be outlawed in a crackdown on the far right in recent years in response to racist killings and attacks.
It follows the decision by the BfV, the domestic intelligence agency, this month to designate the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, the second biggest in parliament, as confirmed right-wing extremist. The AfD has challenged that move in court.
In a media interview last year, Fitzek praised the AfD, saying there were “good people” in the party who “have a little more understanding than many others of what’s going on out here. And I really enjoy talking to people who want to renew things, want to improve things.”