Germany: No investigation against the politician who called Erdogan a “sewer rat”

Prosecutors in Germany will not investigate German politician Wolfgang Kubicki for calling Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan a “sewer rat”.

Hildesheim’s public prosecutor’s office determined there was no reason to suspect a criminal offense, a spokesman said, confirming an earlier report by Der Spiegel.

Kubiki, leader of the Liberal Democrats (FDP), and deputy speaker of the Bundestag, during an election speech in Lower Saxony in September called the Turkish president a “little rat of the sewers” and accused him of using the refugee issue to exert political pressure in Europe. The German politician had later attempted to make amends, speaking of “a small, cute, clever and cunning being, like Ratatouille”, but it seems that he did not convince the other side, as the German ambassador in Ankara was summoned to the Turkish Foreign Ministry in order to to give explanations.

In response, a lawyer for Erdogan filed a lawsuit for libel and defamation.

According to the state prosecutor’s office in the northern German city, the comment could not be considered an “official insult” given the context in which it was made.

The comment, made during a campaign speech, “was also covered by the right to freedom of expression, especially since the limits of permissible criticism are significantly wider in the case of politicians than in the case of private individuals.”

In legal correspondence from October, seen by the German news agency (dpa), Kubiki rejected the accusation and said the term he used should be taken “not as an insult, but rather as recognition” of Erdogan’s skills.

Erdogan’s lawyer, Mustafa Kaplan, said he was appealing the decision. However, according to the prosecutor’s office, no appeal had been filed until this afternoon

Read the News today and get the latest news.
Follow Skai.gr on Google News and be the first to know all the news.