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ByFrankJordans The Associated Press GROSSROEHRSDORF, GER- MANY The 17 North Afri- can refugees turned up just before Christmas — and Si- mon Richter felt nothing to cheer. The electrician and his friends organized a meet- ing that sent out a message loud and clear: We don't want the foreigners in our midst. Within days, author- ities caved to pressure and moved the young men else- where. The episode reflects the increasingly tense mood in the eastern state of Sax- ony, where anti-immigrant protests have been grow- ing by the week, drawing international attention and fears that xenophobia is on the rise again in Germany — whose Nazi past has long made such sentiments taboo. Last week, about 18,000 people marched through the state capital, Dresden, un- der the banner of a group calling itself Patriotic Euro- peans against the Islamiza- tion of the West, or PEGIDA. Strong crowds also showed up for an anti-Is- lam rally Monday night in Dresden, despite calls from Germany's justice minister to cancel this week's rally because of last week's ter- ror attacks in Paris. Some marchers wore black ribbons to show their solidarity with the victims and held up placards with the names of the French journalists killed. Others carried banners condemn- ing the "lying press" that they claim misrepresents their cause. Co-organizer Lutz Bach- mann said "the terrible acts of Paris are further proof that PEGIDA is needed." In other cities across Germany, those attending counter protests outnum- bered anti-Islam demon- strators by far. Berlin police said 4,000 people demon- strated against an anti-Is- lam rally of 400. In Munich 20,000 people took to the streets and only 1,500 anti- Islam protesters showed up. Many of the Dresden marchers in the last few months come from ru- ral areas near the borders with Poland and the Czech Republic. During the rallies they hold up signs with the names of their towns and villages, and insist they aren't racist — just ordi- nary people worried about crime — though skinheads and far-right activists are visible among the crowd. "I think they've got a le- gitimate cause," said Rich- ter, who has attended sev- eral PEGIDA protests him- self. Shortly after the asylum seekers moved into a dis- used gymnasium that au- thorities had set aside as temporary accommoda- tion, police and firefight- ers had to be called to deal with a refugee who had in- jured himself while drunk and another who set fire to some garbage bags. "You have a lot of peo- ple living close to here, as well as a playground and a school," Richter said. "It was simply the worst place to house refugees in a small community." The mood in Grossroeh- rsdorf — population 6,700 — finally turned against the asylum seekers when a 23-year-old local man re- ported to police that he'd been assaulted by one of the foreigners. Days later, police an- nounced that the man had lied. But by then authorities had already decided to shut the gym and disperse the refugees across other asy- lum centers in the region. The decision was a not just a victory for Richter and his friends. The far- right National Democratic Party, or NPD, also saw a reason to celebrate. Its local representative, Juergen Koetzing, told The Associated Press that the party supported the pro- tests in Grossroehrsdorf and has helped with logis- tics behind the scenes dur- ing the PEGIDA marches in Dresden. "We support such events with equipment and the printing of fliers, but the initiative comes from con- cerned people in the various villages," Koetzing said. It's part of the party's new tac- tic since narrowly failing to clear the 5 percent thresh- old in Saxony's regional elections last year. "Until the next election we're going to be doing what I'll call grassroots pol- icy," said Koetzing, a con- struction engineer. As far as PEGIDA is con- cerned, "we're not going to push to the front," he said. "On the basic thrust here, about foreigners tak- ing over Germany, we're in agreement with PEGIDA." PEGIDA representatives didn't respond to requests for comment. Protestant pastor Ste- fan Schwarzenberg, who supports the refugees, said people in Saxony remain af- fected by decades of com- munist rule, even 25 years after the end of the dictator- ship in East Germany. "There are people who are still stuck in their old thinking and their old ho- rizon," he said. TENSE MOOD Fear,farrightamongroots of German anti-Islam rallies ACHMADIBRAHIM—THEASSOCIATEDPRESS Crew members of Crest Onyx ship prepare to unload parts of AirAsia Flight 8501from a ship at Kumai port in Pangkalan Bun on Sunday. By Achmad Ibrahim The Associated Press PANGKALAN BUN, INDONE- SIA Divers retrieved one black box Monday and lo- cated the other from the AirAsia plane that crashed more than two weeks ago, key developments that should help investigators unravel what caused the aircraft to plummet into the Java Sea. The flight data recorder was pulled from beneath a piece of the aircraft's wing and brought to the sea's surface, and the cockpit voice recorder was found hours later, said Suryadi Bambang Supriyadi, oper- ation coordinator for Indo- nesia's national search and rescue agency. He said the voice re- corder was about 20 me- ters (66 feet) from the data recorder but remained lodged beneath wreckage, and divers were struggling to free it at a depth of 32 meters (105 feet). Searchers began zero- ing in on the location a day earlier after three Indo- nesian ships picked up in- tense pings from the area, but they were unable to see the devices due to strong currents and poor visibility. The two instruments, which emit signals from their beacons, are vital to understanding what brought Flight 8501 down on Dec. 28, killing all 162 people on board. They should provide essential information about the plane and all of the con- versations between the captain and co-pilot for the duration of the flight. "There's like 200-plus parameters they record," said aviation safety ex- pert John Goglia, a former U.S. National Transporta- tion Safety Board member. "It's going to provide us an ocean of material." The flight data recorder will be taken to Jakarta, In- donesia's capital, for evalu- ation, and the other black box will be sent as soon as it is retrieved. It could take up to two weeks to down- load and analyze their in- formation, said Nurcahyo Utomo, an investigator at the National Committee for Safety Transportation. The slow-moving hunt, which has often gone days with little progress, was boosted over the weekend when the Airbus A320's tail was lifted from the sea- bed. It was the first major wreckage excavated from the crash site, but the black boxes were not found in- side as hoped. Search efforts have been consistently hampered by big waves and powerful currents created by the re- gion's rainy season. Divers find black boxes from crash FLIGHT DATA RECORDERS JENS MEYER — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS A protestor holds a poster showing German Chancellor Angela Merkel wearing a head scarf in front of the Reichtstags building with a crescent on top and the writing 'Mrs Merkel here is the people' during a rally of the group Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of the West, or PEGIDA, in Dresden, Germany, onMonday. By Lynne O'Donnell The Associated Press CAMP SHORABAK, AFGHAN- ISTAN Afghan officials confirmed for the first time Monday that the extremist Islamic State group is ac- tive in the south, recruiting fighters, flying black flags and, according to some sources, even battling Tal- iban militants. The sources, including an Afghan general and a pro- vincial governor, said a man identified as Mullah Abdul Rauf was actively recruit- ing fighters for the group, which controls large parts of Syria and Iraq. Gen. Mahmood Khan, the deputy commander of the army's 215 Corps, said that within the past week residents of a number of districts in the southern Helmand province have said Rauf's representatives are fanning out to recruit people. "A number of tribal lead- ers, jihadi commanders and some ulema (religious coun- cil members) and other peo- ple have contacted me to tell me that Mullah Rauf had contacted them and invited them to join him," Khan said. But he said the Taliban, which is active across Hel- mand and controls some districts, have warned peo- ple not to contact Rauf. "People are saying that he has raised black flags and even has tried to bring down white Taliban flags in some areas," said Saifullah Sanginwal, a tribal leader in Sangin district. "There are reports that 19 or 20 people have been killed" in fighting between the Tal- iban and the IS group, he added. Rauf was a corps com- mander during the Tali- ban's 1996-2001 rule of Af- ghanistan, according to Amir Mohammad Akun- dzada, the governor of Nim- roz province neighboring Helmand. Akundzada said he is related to Rauf but has not seen him for almost 20 years. Both Khan and Akun- dzada said Rauf was appre- hended after the fall of the Taliban in the U.S.-led in- vasion of Afghanistan and was detained for years at Guantanamo Bay. Khan and Akundzada suggested Rauf may have fallen out with the leaders of the Afghan Taliban after spending time in the Paki- stani city of Quetta, where Afghan officials and ana- lysts believe senior Taliban leaders are based. A video released on- line Saturday purports to show militants from both Afghanistan and Pakistan pledging support to IS. But Akundzada said IS was not likely to gain trac- tion with ordinary Afghans. "People who want to fight in Afghanistan just create new names — one day they are wearing white clothes (of the Taliban) and the next day they have black clothes and call themselves Daesh, but they are the same peo- ple," he said, using the Ar- abic acronym for the IS group. In Washington, State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said the U.S. has noted the "rhetorical mes- sage of support" for the Is- lamic State group by some in Afghanistan. "We continue to watch for signs that these state- ments could amount to something more than just rhetorical support," she said. "That doesn't mean it's unimportant." Analysts say most claims of allegiance to IS in Af- ghanistan have been moti- vated by opportunism and that a new jihadist outfit would find it difficult to es- tablish a presence where there are already long-es- tablished militant groups with tribal links. The Tali- ban have confined their in- surgency to Afghanistan, and do not espouse the pan- Islamic model of jihad em- braced by the Islamic State. Parts of Helmand have seen fierce fighting be- tween the Taliban and Af- ghan security forces since U.S. troops pulled out more than six months ago. RECRUITING FIGHTERS Afghan officials say Islamic State group operating in south Landscape/Fence Steve's Tractor &LandscapeService •FenceBuilding•Landscaping • Trenching • Rototilling • Disking • Mowing • Ridging • Post Hole Digging • Blade Work • Sprinkler Installation • Concrete Work Cont. 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