Clashes reported in German town

Clashes broke out between dozens of asylum-seekers and far-right extremists in an eastern German city, forcing police to call in reinforcements to quell the violence, police said yesterday.

Around 20 migrant youths sparked the violence Wednesday night in the city of Bautzen, police chief Uwe Kilz said, when they flung bottles and wooden slats at around 80 young German men and women from the far-right scene.

Tap Here to Add The Daily Star As A Trusted Source

The right-wing extremists, many of whom were drunk, returned the abuse with stones and bottles, he added, in the latest incident to hit the small former communist town, which has been the scene of several eruptions of hostility toward refugees.

The arrival of around one million asylum-seekers in 2015 has deeply polarised Germany. It recorded nearly 1,000 far-right offences targeting refugee shelters last year.

Illustrating the tensions, a restaurant owner in northern Germany sparked a heated social media debate when he told a woman wearing a niqab to leave after she refused to remove the face veil.

In France, Police arrested three teenagers linked to Islamic State group around Paris in the past week as investigators probe the use of an encrypted messaging app to plot attacks in France, judicial sources said Wednesday.

All the arrests are linked to an investigation into the network of French extremist Rachid Kassim who is fighting for IS in Syria or Iraq.