The video shows troubled parents marching in front of the Foreign Office on a gray march day in Berlin. "It's an absurdity, it's a scandal for Germany," says Edward Six in the film. What he means: the imprisonment of his son Billy Six in Venezuela - and the alleged inaction of the federal government.

The parents want to talk to Foreign Minister Heiko Maas on this day, or one of the state ministers. It's an action in the style of political activists. The meetings are not held, but there is a conversation with two officials of the Office. The father says in the film: "Heiko Maas and the German government does nothing for his liberation."

The video spreads quickly on the net, especially in right-wing populist circles, it finds approval, as Twitter comments show.

The 32-year-old journalist Billy Six was arrested in Venezuela on 17 November last year and has been in solitary confinement for 119 days, according to the parents. At times he went on a hunger strike. The allegations against him include espionage, rebellion and belonging to a criminal organization. "Hanebüchen and in no way occupied" are these allegations, said in the fall Michael Rediske, CEO of the organization "Reporters Without Borders". It is a "common means of authoritarian regime to accuse investigative journalists of espionage".

"Billy, the child"

Six is ​​a man with a turbulent life. He was traveling the world, was once a member of the CDU, temporary councilor in his hometown. In March 2013, SPIEGEL dedicated a story to him after he was detained in Syria for more than two months in a secret service cell. The title tried to capture his character: "Billy, the kid." (Read the story in SPIEGEL here.)

From Syria and even before his incarceration in Venezuela wrote Billy Six, whose parents live in a Brandenburg town near Berlin, especially for the right-wing weekly newspaper "Young Freedom", a leaf that is popular in AfD circles.

This is reason enough for some in the party to put the supposedly inadequate use of German diplomats into a relationship with Six's political stance. Whether it is due to "the mindset of Billy Six" that the federal government is "so inactive", Foreign Minister Maas was asked in February by AfD-faction leader Jürgen Braun in the Bundestag. The SPD politician rejected the "insinuation", relied on the contacts of his house to the detainee.

AfD makes mood with the case Six

The Billy Six case is becoming increasingly politically charged these days, becoming a central theme for the AfD. This Tuesday, the parents of Billy Six appeared at a press conference with Brandenburg's AfD leader Andreas Kalbitz, a representative of the far right "wing" of the party. The appearance in Potsdam - the AFD parliamentary group has taken up the case with its own application - gives the parents even more attention. But if he helps her son?

The Foreign Office defends itself against the accusations of doing too little, the diplomats are also offended in their professional honor. At the request of SPIEGEL, the Ministry presented an overview of its activities this week. Since the arrest became known, everything possible has been done "to secure the facts of the arrest and to gain consular access":

  • Former Ambassador Daniel Kriener personally visited Six,
  • Repeated talks have been held with high-ranking representatives of the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry,
  • Berlin also had a conversation with the Venezuelan Ambassador in the Foreign Office.

"All this is extraordinary and goes far beyond the usual level of detention care," said the Foreign Office, the efforts have also allowed the appointment of a lawyer. In the "Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung" Father Six was recently quoted in his version: The family had only got a list of lawyers with name and address, he had organized the legal counsel in Venezuela himself.

picture alliance / AP / Edward Six

Billy Six in October 2018 in Bucaramanga, Colombia

Foreign Ministry officials also visited Six in custody, according to the ministry, reportedly on 9 January, 8 February and 6 March. Accordingly, the then ambassador came for the first visit.

At the end of November 2018 talks were held with the Venezuelan Deputy Foreign Minister Yvan Gil on the Six case. The Federal Foreign Office was committed to "respecting and respecting Mr. Six's rights and giving him a transparent and constitutional process". Similarly, Maas had taken in February in the Bundestag.

These days, the parents have spread a photo to show their son in the prison of Sebin intelligence "El Helicode" in the capital Caracas. The picture was taken at the beginning of March by an employee of the German Embassy, ​​the "Junge Freiheit" has published it these days.

Domestic situation complicates the diplomatic efforts

The Billy Six case has long since become a political stand-off. AfD politicians hold German media before, not to press with the same emphasis for its release as once for the imprisoned in Turkey "world" journalist Deniz Yücel. SPIEGEL ONLINE reported in the fall about Six 'arrest, other media also took up the case. And Yücel himself also demanded early on the release of Billy Six, on Twitter on Twitter on December 24: "The freedom of the word is or is not valid, it is indivisible."

What's going on in the Six case is uncertain at the moment, also given the domestic political situation. In Venezuela, the power struggle between the socialist president Nicolás Maduro and the opposition politician Juan Guaidó, the German Ambassador Kriener had to leave the country this week as an "unwanted person" because he is the self-proclaimed transitional president Guaidó along with other diplomats on his return to the airport in Caracas.

On the consular care for the jailed journalists, this has no "immediate impact," it said on Tuesday in the Foreign Office to the SPIEGEL. After all: The military court has closed the case against Billy Six at the end of February. There is now a new trial at the civil court in Caracas.