German police on Sunday were investigating neo-Nazi attack on leftists that occurred when buses carrying members of the opposing groups stopped the previous evening at the same highway rest area, according to dpa. The incident followed marches on Saturday in the city of Dresden, where 6,000 far-rightists tried to whip up nationalist sentiment by calling a February 13-14 Allied air raid on the city a "war crime." Some 10,000 trade unionists, leftists and pacifists from around Germany had held an anti-Nazi rally at the same time. Separately, groups of radical leftist youths tried to disrupt the neo-Nazi rally and injured 30 riot police, the police said. In the aftermath, as both sides dispersed to their homes elsewhere in Germany, five persons from the anti-Nazi group were injured at the highway rest area near Stadtroda in central Germany. Police said about 80 persons in two buses chartered by anti-Nazi groups were verbally abused by 41 rightists from western Germany and Sweden and then attacked. Police said they were checking reports that two leftists were injured, one with a broken knee and the other with a skull fracture. By the time police reached the rest area, the assailants had left but their bus was stopped 15 kilometres away and the names of all the occupants were taken. Much of Dresden was destroyed and about 25,000 Germans burned to death by Allied firebomb raids on the city late February 13 and early February 14, 1945. Left-right clashes are common on the anniversary.
