Alexander Dobrindt, the incoming German interior minister, said on Sunday that the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party was unlikely to be outlawed after being designated as “extremist” by the intelligence agency last week.
German politicians have been contemplating banning the party as well as other measures such as firing AfD members from government service and reducing or terminating public funding.
However, Dobrindt told ARD that he doubted if the AfD operations mentioned in the intelligence agency’s assessment satisfied the standards for an absolute prohibition.
The constitutional court’s guidelines provide that a party must demonstrate that it is acting “combatively and aggressively” to achieve its aims in order to be outlawed.
“I’m sceptical, because the aggressive, combative nature of the party against our democracy must be a defining characteristic. The Constitutional Court was right to set high hurdles for banning a party,” Dobrindt said.
Content retrieved from: https://www.firstpost.com/world/germany-afd-ban-unlikely-despite-extremist-tag-says-incoming-interior-minister-13885448.html.
