Germany’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz has urged democrats to stand up to far-right “fanatics” following reports that two senior members of the Alternative for Germany party (AfD) took part in a meeting where plans to deport millions of immigrants, even those with German citizenship, were discussed should extreme right-wing alignments come to power.
The allegations, published mid-week by the investigative journalists’ group Correctiv, have led to uproar in the country given the parallels with the Nazi ideology for deporting people not ethnically German.
AfD has not refuted the claim that its politicians were among those attending the November meeting near Berlin. Far-right opinion-maker Martin Sellner is said to have outlined plans for the “remigration” of “unassimilated” people with German citizenship out of the country. However, AfD has said that such plans were not party policy.
Chancellor Scholz was adamant that Germany will not allow anyone living in the country to be judged based on whether they have foreign roots or not.
“We protect everyone — regardless of origin, skin colour or how uncomfortable someone is for fanatics with assimilation fantasies,” he declared on X. Anyone opposing “our free democratic order”, he warned, would be accountable to Germany’s domestic intelligence office and the judiciary. Learning from history “is about more than just lip service — democrats must stand together”, he noted.
With regional and European elections scheduled this year, AfD has been surging in the polls, its appeal bolstered by the rising immigration numbers that have been making inroads on the country’s overburdened public finances and state services. The fact that all political parties have committed to crack down on illegal immigration has only served to spotlight AfD’s approach to the issue.
The party’s lead candidate for next November’s European Parliament elections, Maximilian Krah, unabashedly reiterated the party’s pledge to deport illegal immigrants, pointing out on X that 2.7 million people migrated to Germany in 2022. “That is destroying our country! Only the AfD will stop this and arrange their return.”
