Waters mentioned depictions of an ‘unhinged fascist demagogue’ have been featured in Pink Floyd live shows since 1980.
Pink Floyd’s frontman Roger Waters mentioned he opposes “fascism” in all its types following a furore in Germany the place the rockstar’s donning of a Nazi-style uniform at a Berlin live performance sparked a police investigation.
Berlin police mentioned on Friday they have been probing Waters after photographs of the Pink Floyd co-founder circulated on social media, displaying him on stage final week on the Mercedes-Benz enviornment carrying an extended, black coat with pink armbands and firing an imitation World Warfare II sub-machine gun.
Police are investigating the “suspicion of incitement to public hatred as a result of the clothes worn on stage might be used to glorify or justify Nazi rule”, a police spokesman informed the French information company AFP.
When the police investigation is concluded, the case shall be handed to Berlin prosecutors, police mentioned.
Felix Klein, the German authorities’s commissioner on the battle in opposition to anti-Semitism, known as for Waters to be held accountable. Klein mentioned authorities have to be “vigilant” following the incident and music venues ought to rethink their relationship with the musician, in response to a report in Germany’s Funke media group.
“Live performance organisers ought to think about whether or not they need to provide conspiracy theorists a platform,” Klein was reported as saying.
In a press release posted on his Twitter account on Saturday, Waters mentioned his Berlin live performance had “attracted dangerous religion assaults from those that need to smear and silence me as a result of they disagree with my political beliefs”.
Waters mentioned makes an attempt to painting his efficiency as something however anti-Fascist have been “disingenuous and politically motivated”.
“The weather of my efficiency which were questioned are fairly clearly a press release in opposition to fascism, injustice, and bigotry in all its types,” he mentioned.
— Roger Waters ✊ (@rogerwaters) May 26, 2023
“The depiction of an unhinged fascist demagogue has been a characteristic of my reveals since Pink Floyd’s ‘The Wall’ in 1980,” he mentioned.
“I’ve spent my complete life talking out in opposition to authoritarianism and oppression the place I set it… My mother and father fought the Nazis in World Warfare II, with my father paying the final word worth,” he mentioned.
“Whatever the penalties of the assaults in opposition to me, I’ll proceed to sentence injustice and all those that perpetrate it.”
Water is a well-known pro-Palestinian activist who has been accused of holding anti-Jewish views. He has floated an inflatable pig emblazoned with the Star of David at his live shows. The singer denies the anti-Semitism accusations, saying he was protesting against Israeli policies, not Jewish folks.
Waters has performed in a number of German cities in current weeks as a part of his “This Is Not A Drill” tour. But it surely has been vastly controversial with some metropolis officers even making an attempt, unsuccessfully, to ban him from performing.
On the identical Berlin live performance, Waters additionally flashed the names of a number of deceased folks on a big display screen, together with that of Anne Frank, the Jewish teenager who died in a Nazi focus camp.
Additionally named was slain Palestinian-American Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, who was shot useless by Israeli forces within the occupied West Financial institution final yr.
Abu Akleh’s household have submitted an official criticism to the Worldwide Prison Courtroom (ICC) to demand justice for her loss of life.
Waters is because of play his closing German live performance within the western metropolis of Frankfurt on Sunday night and protesters are planning to display outdoors the venue.
Frankfurt metropolis authorities sought to cease the live performance however a courtroom dominated in opposition to them, citing inventive freedom.
