Germany’s Social Democrats (SPD) are pressing to ban the country’s far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party as unconstitutional.
Some conservative MPs have cautioned against a rush to judgement since the SPD junior partnership in Germany’s ruling coalition filed a motion urging that the way be cleared to ban the far-right party.
AfD, the foremost opposition party in the German parliament, is at the heart of a growing debate triggered when Germany’s domestic intelligence agency reclassified it as a “confirmed right-wing extremist” group in May. That assessment is currently subject to a court review, which is being challenged by AfD.
SPD’s motion emerged from the party’s three-day congress in Berlin and calls on the relevant constitutional bodies to initiate filing a case that would declare the anti-immigrant AfD unconstitutional.
SPD co-leader Lars Klingbeil, Finance Minister and Vice Chancellor of Germany’s conservative-led government, made it clear to the Berlin party congress that once the domestic intelligence agency identified AfD as a “confirmed right-wring extremist party”, the party was compelled to act.
Yesterday, however, Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt – a member of the conservative Christian Social Union (CSU) – told the “Table.Today” podcast that decisions made at the SPD party conference were not “a mandate for the interior minister.”
Better, he cautioned, to allow the legal process to play out, noting that a working group of German state interior ministers would tackle the AfD issue should the court uphold the “right-wing extremist” designation.
Currently, the working group awaits a ruling from the Cologne Administrative Court on whether it agrees with the “extremist” designation.
