The wall is gone, but the scars of Stasi brutality remain
Some 20 years on, with statute of limitation on their crimes passed, former Stasi officers have reorganised to spread disinformation and even attack former prisoners in public. Yesterday evening, they met at a high-profile conference in Vienna.
Like all former East German civil servants, Stasi officials receive regular state pensions. Last year the wage bill for retired army, customs and Stasi officers totalled €1.6 billion.
Meanwhile many of their former victims, with only limited social welfare entitlements, live in often shocking poverty.
After nearly two decades of discussion, the Bundestag agreed last year to pay Stasi victims a pension of €250 a month. The criteria for the means-tested pensions are so strict, however, that just 16,000 people have a claim, out of the estimated 200,000 former Stasi prisoners.
For film-maker Stefan Weinert, Gesicht zur Wand was his contribution to counter the trend of downplaying the horrors of the East German dictatorship.
With no distractions, no archive f