Germany to stiffen laws after rise in knife crime

The German government plans to introduces legislation stiffening laws on the carrying of weapons, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser told the Sunday edition of the mass-circulation Bild tabloid following an increase in knife crime, reported dpa.

The new law will "further restrict the carrying of knives in public," Faeser said. In future blade lengths will be limited to 6 centimetres, down from 12 centimetres, and there will be a total ban on switchblades or flick knives.

She was speaking in response to a rise in knife incidents on railway stations.

Andreas Roßkopf, spokesman for the GdP police trade union said: "Implementing a general knife ban on stations is a sensible measure. Legal changes are required here, so that the federal police can monitor them. At the moment, checks without cause are not possible," he said.

The federal police, who are responsible for railway stations, provisionally recorded 380 knife crimes on stations in the first half of this year, compared with 650 for the whole of 2023.

There were 84 knife incidents on moving trains in the first half, compared with 196 for last year as a whole.

Faeser was responding to calls from the interior ministers of Germany's 16 states for federal regulations on the carrying of knives in order to unify the legislation.

Current transport regulations ban the carrying of objects or materials that could be used to injure passengers or damage carriages.