Rallies on Saturday: Thousands of Germans demonstrate against the right

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Tens of thousands of Germans took part in demonstrations against the right on Saturday. According to the police, up to 100,000 people turned out in Düsseldorf alone. There were also demonstrations in many other places in Germany, in some places with prominent political support. The Prime Minister of Baden-Württemberg, Winfried Kretschmann (75), was there privately in Sigmaringen, and the Prime Minister of Schleswig-Holstein, Daniel Günther (50) and the Federal Finance Minister Christian Lindner (45), also demonstrated in Aachen. In Osnabrück, Defense Minister Boris Pistorius (63) warned against the AfD during a demonstration.

Police and organizers spoke of approximately 25,000 demonstration participants. Pistorius said the AfD wanted systemic change. “That means nothing more than that they want to return to the dark times of racial madness, discrimination, inequality and injustice.” He drew a comparison with the Weimar Republic, which was destroyed not by its enemies, but by the weakness of its friends. “Today we know better, history should not repeat itself.”

The demonstration took place in Düsseldorf under the motto ‘Against the AfD – We will not be silent. We don’t look away. We act!” The demonstrators included people of all ages, including many families with children. In the Düsseldorf tradition, some demonstrators marched with punk music. The banners bore inscriptions such as “I generally don’t like Nazis” and “Not weather!” A 69-year-old, who said he was participating in a demonstration for the first time in decades, said: “If we don’t show our colors now, we’re going in a direction we can’t get out of.”

The mayor of Düsseldorf, Stephan Keller (CDU), said that around 1930 the dangers to the first German democracy were underestimated. Warners were laughed at. “This must not happen to us again,” he warned. “We shout to the extremists: you will never be in the majority again!”

Demos from Lübeck to Singen

In Kiel, the police counted around 11,500 participants in a demonstration against right-wing extremism and anti-Semitism. “Our democracy is more stable than the democracy of 100 years ago, but let’s not be too sure about that,” says Mayor Ulf Kampf (51). According to the police, there were about 8,000 demonstrators in Lübeck, about 6,000 in Kaiserslautern and about 4,000 in Worms. According to initial information from officials, there were about 12,500 people in Aachen and more than 12,000 in Marburg. In Weimar the police counted 1,500 people, the organizers spoke of 2,000.

But people also took to the streets in smaller towns, a selection: according to the first information, the police counted 4,000 demonstrators in Singen, and about 2,000 people in Sigmaringen. In Neumarkt in der Oberpfalz, officials spoke of about 1,500 people at a demonstration against the right, and in Elmshorn about 4,000 people.

Demonstrations have been going on for a few days now

According to the Federal Ministry of the Interior, more than 900,000 people took part in anti-right-wing demonstrations last weekend. She based herself on information from the police. Protests continued on Friday, for example in Frankfurt am Main, Saarbrücken, Herne and Gütersloh. Last Saturday’s demonstrations coincided with Holocaust Remembrance Day, on which numerous events commemorated the victims of National Socialism.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz (65) welcomed the numerous demonstrations against right-wing extremism in recent days and weeks. ‘Our country is currently on its feet. Millions of citizens are taking to the streets,” he said in his weekly “Chancellor Compact” video. It is the solidarity of the democrats that makes democracy strong. «Our democracy is not given by God. It is man-made. She is strong if we support her. And she’ll need us if she’s attacked.”

Elections in three East German states in September

The protests were triggered by revelations from the Correctiv research center about a meeting of the radical right on November 25, in which several AfD politicians as well as individual members of the CDU and the very conservative Values ​​Union in Potsdam participated. The former head of Austria’s right-wing extremist Identitarian Movement, Martin Sellner, 35, said he spoke about “remigration” during the meeting. When right-wing extremists use the term, they usually mean that large numbers of people of foreign origin must leave the country – even under duress. According to Correctiv, Sellner mentioned three target groups: asylum seekers, foreigners with right of residence and “non-assimilated citizens”.

New state parliaments will be elected in Brandenburg, Saxony and Thuringia in September. According to surveys, the AfD could become the strongest force in all three states, even by a significant margin. In two national surveys conducted last week by the institutes Insa and Forsa (for ‘Bild’ and for RTL/ntv), the AfD lost popularity, but remained the strongest force after the Union with 21.5 and 20 percent respectively. In Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia, the AfD is assessed as definitively right-wing extremist by the relevant Office for the Protection of the Constitution, and classified nationally as a suspected case. (SDA)

Source: Blick