<p>BERLIN — The number of suspected far-right incidents in the German military surged to 477 last year from 363 in 2019, parliament’s commissioner for the military said Tuesday.</p>
<p>Eva Hoegl stressed as she presented her annual report that “soldiers are not under general suspicion and the absolute majority does a responsible job every day."</p>
<p>But she said the number of incidents involving far-right extremism are a source of concern and show that “there’s a lot to do.”</p>
<p>“There’s no place for far-right extremism in the army,” Hoegl wrote in the report. “We need investigations, sanctions and prevention — in a consistent, complete and fast way.”</p>
<p>Hoegl demanded that more staff be hired to speed up investigations.</p>
<p>The report comes at a time of broader concerns that Germany has not done enough to tackle right-wing extremism within its Bundeswehr military in general. The country’s special forces, the KSK, have faced particular scrutiny after numerous allegations of far-right extremism in recent years.</p>
<p>As a consequence of far-right scandals involving the special forces, the defense minister disbanded one of the KSK’s units in July and vowed to to further investigate extremism and implement reforms.</p>
<p>The rise in far-right extremism in the army mirrors a growing overall number of anti-Semitic, anti-migrant or homophobic attacks in Germany.</p>
<p>In 2020, 183,777 soldiers served in the German military, 23,066 of them women.</p>
