BERLIN — German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and European Union leaders denounced on Saturday (May 4) a recent spate of attacks on politicians in Germany, including one that sent a member of the European Parliament to hospital with serious injuries.

Matthias Ecke, 41, a member of Scholz's Social Democrats (SPD), was hit and kicked on Friday by a group of four people while putting up posters in Dresden, capital of the eastern state of Saxony, police said. An SPD source said his injuries would require an operation.

Shortly before, what appeared to be the same group attacked a 28-year-old campaigner for the Greens, who was also putting up posters, police said, although his injuries were not as severe.

"Democracy is threatened by this kind of thing," Scholz told a convention of European socialists in Berlin.

The attacks exemplify increased violence in Germany in recent years, often from the far-right, targeting especially leftist politicians. The BfV domestic intelligence agency says far-right extremism is the biggest threat to German democracy.

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