(AP)
The German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung reported on July 10 that about 1,200 women were sexually assaulted by about 2,000 men in various parts of Germany on New Year’s Eve, according to a leaked police document.
The numbers are an increase from the initial stories that at least 90 women had filed police reports of sexual assault in January and that up to 1,000 men were suspected.
Many of the 120 suspects who were identified by July 10 were foreigners who had recently arrived in Germany, including many from North Africa, according to Süddeutsche Zeitung.
However, Holger Münch, president of the German Federal Crime Police Office, told Sueddeutsche Zeitung, "There is a connection between the emergence of this phenomenon and the rapid migration [of about 1 million Syrian, Iraqi, and other refugees] in 2015.”
Although a few suspects have been tried, "We have to presume that many of those crimes will never be fully investigated" because many perpetrators cannot be identified, said Münch.