Germany: "We're Ready for the World Cup"

Last week's incident at the opening of Berlin's new main train station, in which a 16-year-old ran amok and indiscriminately stabbed dozens of people, prompted many policymakers to call for a complete revision of the security concept for the forthcoming World Cup.

But at Wednesday's presentation of the final progress report on preparations for the event, Interior Minister Wolfgang Schäuble insisted that security plans were tight enough and were not in need of improvements. He agreed with police officers who said that a person running amok would not be the typical situation.

"In order to avoid such incidents you'd have to make sure that people didn't come together in large crowds, and that would mean doing away with all public viewing areas during the World Cup -- that's out of the question," Schäuble said. "This is not a problem that must be linked to the World Cup."

Schäuble added that all possible precautions were being taken to guarantee the safety of the people gathering at hundreds of public viewing areas across the country during the tournament. He also criticized demands to ban the sale of alcohol to partying soccer fans as unrealistic.

Anti-racism campaigns

The head of the German organizing committee, Franz Beckenbauer, said that anti-racism campaigns would feature prominently during the sports event.

"Here in Germany we've seen the need for additional service and friendliness campaigns to ensure that visitors will feel at home," Beckenbauer said. "We're poised to show the world that we're friendly hosts. We have the best of intentions -- the rest is in God's hands."

Schäuble too was anxious to stress German hospitality after a spate of negative publicity over racist attacks.

"Germany is an open, peaceful and tolerant country, and we will show that during the World Cup," he said.

Preventing hooliganism

The interior minister also gave an assurance that everything possible had been done in the run-up to the World Cup to avoid any incidents involving hooligan violence. He praised what he called the "excellent cooperation" with the police and state authorities from the participating nations.

In Britain, more than 3,000 known soccer hooligans have been called upon to hand over their passports to police to prevent them from traveling to the World Cup in Germany. They will also be required to register at a police station each time England play during the tournament. Troublemakers who fail to comply with the order will face six months in prison and a fine of up to 5,000 pounds or 7,200 euros ($9,300).