German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt accused the far-right party this Monday Alternative to Germany (AfD) to behave like a subordinate political organization to the Russian President, Vladimir Putin.
Dobrindt told today’s edition of the German economic newspaper Handelsblattthat the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party “openly” demonstrates closeness to the President of Russia, adding that it behaves like a “Vladimir Putin’s German party”.
The Minister of the Interior (corresponding to Internal Administration) also said that the AfD itself promotes suspicions that there are more than just sympathies towards Moscow.
Alexander Dobrindt referred to the recent reviews from other parties, notably from the Minister of the Interior of the eastern state of Thuringia, the social democrat Georg Maier.
The Thuringian politician last week accused the AfD of abusing the right to ask questions in the Regional Parliament and also in the Federal Parliamentsince the questions focused mainly on strategic and defense infrastructures from Germany.
Likewise, for Dobrindt, the AfD’s criticism of the Federal Government’s policy of supporting Ukraine and the imposition of sanctions against Russia, were not surprising because the main opposition party in the Bundestag (Lower House of the Federal Parliament) is “suspected of spying” to Russia.
“In the case of a party that supports (Vladimir) Putin so openly, it is not surprising that such suspicions are being expressed,” the Interior Minister said today.
Tino Chrupalla, co-president of the AfD and who shares the leadership of the far-right party’s parliamentary group in the Federal Parliament, responded on Sunday to the accusations, which he called “ridiculous”, in an interview with the television station ZDF.
At national level, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, the name given in Germany to the information services of the Ministry of the Interior, considers the AfD a “suspected case of right-wing extremism”.
Last May, the federal body classified the AfD as a case of right-wing extremism, although the party is currently challenging the decision in court.
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