Germany: Thousands of Germans demonstrated against the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party in the country’s towns and cities.
Protests against the AfD took place on Sunday in Leipzig, Dresden, and other traditional AfD voting strongholds in eastern Germany, in addition to Berlin, Munich, and Cologne.
According to national polls, the AfD is trailing the main centre-right opposition bloc but ahead of the government parties. However, demonstrations against the far-right party gained momentum after an investigative news website reported on January 10th that a meeting of right-wing extremists in Germany regarding immigration policies had discussed mass deportations of foreign nationals.
Among those present at the talks was Mr. Martin Sellner, the leader of Austria’s Identitarian Movement, who thinks non-white immigrants are going to replace the “native” white population in Europe.
The AfD claims that the reported migration plans are not party policy. “Nazis out” and “no place for Nazis” were among the signs carried by protesters outside Berlin’s German parliament on Sunday.
200,000 people showed up, according to the protest organisers in Munich, but due to overcrowding, the event had to be cancelled early.
“Some might not be sure whether they will vote for the AfD or not, but after this protest, they simply cannot,” she said.
Authorities had to reroute a protest march in Dresden, the capital of Saxony’s eastern region, where the far-right party is leading in the polls.
The procession was extended to accommodate a “massive quantity of participants,” Dresden police stated on the social media site X.
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