(Munster) One month before the European elections, the German far-right AfD party suffered a new setback on Monday after the courts authorized intelligence to maintain close surveillance of this group suspected of “extremism”.
This is another hard blow for this movement, already in the sights of justice for its alleged links with Russia and China.
The decision of the court in Münster (north-west of the country) to reject a request from the AfD against its classification as “suspicious of extremism” was welcomed by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
“Our democracy has the means to defend itself. Our rule of law protects our democracy. Also against threats from within,” launched the social democratic leader on his X account.
This legal dispute has been going on since 2021: the German domestic intelligence services (BfV), the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, had decided to categorize the AfD as a “group suspected of right-wing extremism”, which allows surveillance more narrow.
The AfD challenged this decision in court and in 2022 the court in Cologne (West) rejected its request, leading the party to turn to the higher court in Münster.
The party “does not have the right to demand that the BfV refrain from monitoring it”, affirmed the Münster court in its judgment.
Existing laws “provide a sufficient legal basis for observing [ce parti, NDLR] as a suspect,” he added.
The party’s youth organization, Junge Alternative, is placed in the same boat as the AfD, under the ruling.
Contempt for dignity
Detailing the decision, Judge Gerald Buck found that there was sufficient evidence to suspect the AfD of pursuing aspirations linked to a “contempt for the human dignity” of foreigners and Muslims.
At least a significant part of the AfD aims to “grant German citizens with immigrant backgrounds only a legally devalued status,” he said.
For their part, AfD lawyers asserted that the statements made by some of its members, collected by the intelligence services, should not be attributed to the party as a whole, which has around 45,000 members.
Furious, AfD co-president Alice Weidel said Monday’s ruling was “not acceptable”. “We will meet again [au tribunal administratif, NDLR] in Leipzig (East),” she said, suggesting that her party wanted to challenge the decision before the higher courts.
PHOTO ANNEGRET HILSE, REUTERS
The two leaders of the AfD, Alice Weidel and Tino Chrupalla
Tino Chrupalla, the party’s other co-president, said that “there was a domestic political motivation behind all this.” “We are in the middle of the European electoral campaign,” he remarked.
For his part, the president of the domestic intelligence services (BfV), Thomas Haldenwang, welcomed Münster’s judgment.
“The Office for the Protection of the Constitution plays an important role in alerting people to aspirations that go against the fundamental liberal and democratic order,” he said. And to promise: “We will continue to fulfill this mission in the future”.
Created in 2013, this populist and anti-migrant party had the wind in its sails in the polls until the beginning of the year and hoped to triumph in the European elections in June and in three regional elections in September in the east of the country (former GDR). , considered his stronghold.
But since then, scandals have accumulated and his popularity has eroded.
In mid-January, the participation of some of these members in a meeting of the ultra-right to discuss a plan for the mass expulsion of foreigners or people of foreign origin from Germany was revealed.
Then in April, an investigation was opened for suspicion of Russian and Chinese financing against its head of list in the European election, MEP Maximilian Krah, including one of the assistants in the European Parliament, suspected of being a Chinese agent, had just been arrested.