E/CN.4/1996/72/Add.2 page 4 B. Exasperation at the fringes of society following the massive influx of asylum-seekers 14. Another explanation put forward, exasperation at the fringe of the German population provoked by the influx of immigrants, asylum-seekers and of “pseudo-asylum-seekers” 2 following the political changes in eastern Europe and the crisis in Yugoslavia. Some analysts suggest there was a “social protest” springing from “diffuse sentiments and the notion of a general threat, and the disadvantageous position of 'Germans' vis-à-vis 'foreigners', particularly asylum-seekers”. 3 This notion was fed in particular by the housing situation and State subsidies and transfers to asylum-seekers, and heightened by the fear of competition and loss of status. The xenophobia engendered in this setting then spread beyond asylum-seekers to encompass all foreigners. The support lent by some of the inhabitants of Hoyerswerda and Rostock to the arsonists is significant in this regard. 15. Between 1989 and 1993 the number of asylum-seekers in Germany rose from 121,318 to 322,599. In 1990 and 1991, Germany received around 58 per cent of the individuals seeking asylum in the European Community. By 1992 that proportion had risen to around 79 per cent. 4 The increase was because German legislation, more flexible than in other European countries, made it attractive to asylum-seekers. Until its amendment in 1993, article 16 of the Basic Law, drawn up in 1949 in a cold war setting, granted political refugee status almost automatically to any asylum-seeker. It is thought that many asylum-seekers, described as “economic refugees”, sought to take advantage of this constitutional provision to settle in Germany. The conditions they were offered (housing and financial assistance) provoked xenophobic reactions in the Länder and townships concerned and gave rise to an impassioned public debate on revision of the right to asylum. 16. But the large-scale presence of asylum-seekers is only part of the explanation for the xenophobic violence, because that violence chiefly affected the most visible applicants (Gypsies and Africans, although they were not the majority of asylum-seekers) and foreigners who had lived in Germany for many years (Turks, Vietnamese, Mozambicans and Angolans). In fact, the wave of violence was attributable rather to agitation from the extreme right, which used the presence of foreigners as a pretext for spreading its racist ideology and operating in broad daylight. C. The aggressiveness of the extreme right 17. Ideologically, racist nationalism is a feature of rightist extremism. A second vital component is the notion of an élite race. In such an ideology, it is not a shared historical, cultural and linguistic background that determines whether one belongs to a people or nation, but only common biological origins. The people and the nation are the wellspring of the élite race. This ideology underpins xenophobic violence against asylum-seekers and other foreigners as a means of cleansing the German nation of undesirable elements. The arson in Mölln is of heavy symbolic significance in this regard. 18. By the end of 1994, the German authorities responsible for upholding the Constitution had 82 organizations and associations of individuals under