German officials call for illegal firework ban after five deaths and riots

German officials have called for restrictions on illegal fireworks as well as harsher sentences for rioters attacking emergency workers after five people were killed, and dozens of civilians and police officers were injured across Germany on New Year's Eve.

Officials have pointed particularly to the use of "kugelbomben" or bullet bombs — explosives that are legally restricted to professional firework displays — for the multiple injuries from fireworks across the country, including 17 in Berlin alone.

“The severity of the injuries [this year] is unusual,” a spokesperson for the UKB hospital in Berlin, where small children were brought in for serious injuries from fireworks, told local media.

"For young men, it's no longer enough that it's the sparkler. It is also no longer the legal firecracker," said Jochen Kopelke, federal chairman of the police union, GdP, adding that bullet bombs with more explosive power were being thrown into crowds.

The bombs are largely imported into Germany from neighbouring countries such as Poland and the Czech Republic and are illegal in Germany aside from professional firework displays.

Politicians this year called for stricter border controls to limit the use of illegal pyrotechnics, with CDU politician Burkard Dregger calling the use of bullet bombs the "main cause of the injuries and property damage" this year.

“The import of banned fireworks from eastern neighbouring countries has got to be stopped with even stricter border checks,” Dregger told broadcaster RBB.

Five people died across Germany, the majority from homemade pyrotechnics that exploded prematurely. At least one death, of a 21-year-old man in Brandenburg, is being investigated over the use of an illegal firework.

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