Almost a week after a Ghanaian family was caught up in an altercation in a small German town, hundreds of people formed a human chain as they called for tolerance and denounced racism.
Police said around 460 people gathered on Thursday evening in Grevesmühlen, a northern town of about 10,500 residents. They were linked by coloured ribbons as they stood in the Ploggenseering housing estate, where the incident occurred on June 14.
Grevesmühlen's mayor Lars Prahler and the state culture minister for Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Bettina Martin, were in attendance at the event.
According to the police, a physical altercation between a group of German youths and a Ghanaian father took place in Grevesmühlen last Friday, during which the man was slightly injured.
He went to confront the youths after an 11-year-old allegedly tripped his 8-year-old daughter.
Racist remarks were said to have been made during the fight. According to the police, assault charges were also filed against the Ghanaian father.
The case made national headlines because the police initially reported that the girl had been kicked in the face and injured. This account was later corrected. The girl was not injured and, according to the information provided by police, she had not been kicked in the face.
The 11-year-old had hit the girl with the tip of his foot when he blocked her path with his outstretched leg.
The investigation into the case is still ongoing and, nearly a week on, it is not totally clear what unfolded between the youths and the family.
Local media reported that some of the young people who were involved in the incident in the Ploggenseering neighbourhood had been banned from the Grevesmühlen town festival shortly beforehand after making xenophobic remarks.
A knife is also said to have played a role in the incident involving the Ghanaian family. The Ostsee-Zeitung newspaper reported that a video of the confrontation shows a young man being held by his peers while others shout in the background "He has a knife!"
A spokesperson for the public prosecutor's office in the nearby city of Schwerin told dpa on Thursday that investigators were still analyzing photos and videos from the scene. They are focussing on the question of whether a dangerous object played a role.
A human chain also formed around Schwerin Cathedral on Thursday evening. State justice minister Jacqueline Bernhardt and the Catholic Archbishop of Hamburg, Stefan Heße, took part.