A far-right party has won a regional election in Germany for the first time since the Second World War.
Alternative for Germany (AfD), founded in 2013 with an anti-migration and eurosceptic agenda, picked up the most votes in the eastern state of Thuringia.
The party won 32.8% of the vote, followed by mainstream conservatives the centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) with 23.6%.
It is the first time a far-right party has won the most seats in a German state parliament since the Second World War.
But AfD is almost certain to be excluded from power by rival parties.
AfD also performed well in the neighbouring state of Saxony, where it was a close second behind the CDU by just half a percentage point, a ZDF exit poll said.
The CDU, which has governed Saxony since German reunification more than 30 years ago and is the main opposition party at national level, appeared set to secure 32% of the vote in the state.
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But the AfD was narrowly behind with 31.5% on Sunday, according to the poll.
Speaking after the results, AfD’s leader in Thuringia Bjorn Hocke said he felt “a great, great deal of pride”.
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However, when it was pointed out that Germany’s domestic intelligence agency has his local party branch under official surveillance as a “proven right-wing extremist” group, he bristled at the question and said: “Please stop stigmatising me. We are the number one party in Thuringia.
“You don’t want to classify one-third of the voters in Thuringia as right-wing extremists.”
Hocke himself has been convicted of knowingly using a Nazi slogan at political events – he is appealing.
Celebration and devastation after state elections
The exit polls predicting the far-right Alternative for Germany party (AfD) has won the most seats in Thuringia’s state parliament sparked both celebration and devastation.
Huge cheers erupted from the pub where the party faithful were holding their watch party.
The news they were coming a close second in neighbouring Saxony will have buoyed them further.
If the win in Thuringia is confirmed, this will be the first time since World War Two that a far-right party has the most seats in a German state parliament.
Anti-immigration, populist messages of “Germany first” appealed to many voters in the former communist east where numerous people told me they feel forgotten or disconnected from the national government.
But other residents who were casting their votes in Erfurt on Sunday were deeply unnerved by the idea that the far-right might seize victory.
They know that a pact by other parties not to go into coalition with the AfD means it is unlikely to get full control of Thuringia’s parliament but the fact it has won such a huge slice of support is disturbing to some who fear Germany is stepping in a dangerous direction.
The AfD in Thuringia is being monitored by state intelligence authorities as “extremist”, and their top candidate, Bjorn Hocke, was this year found guilty of using a banned Nazi slogan – yet it appears one in three voters still backed them.
That has disturbed some Germans, as voter David warned: “In our history, we have had national socialist movement in 1933 in Weimar and hopefully we will not repeat it again.”
About 3.3 million people were eligible to vote in Saxony and nearly 1.7 million in Thuringia.
The left populist Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW), which like the AfD demands stricter controls on immigration and wants to stop arming Ukraine, came third in both states, with up to 16% of the vote in Thuringia and 12% in Saxony.
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Germany fears far-right rise
Setback for German chancellor’s coalition
The far-right success is a blow to the coalition of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz just a year before the federal election in September 2025.
Mr Scholz’s Social Democratic Party (SPD) currently governs nationally with the Greens and liberal Free Democrats (FDP). Those parties had weak results on Sunday.
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‘Stop calling voters neo-Nazis’
AfD is unlikely to be able to form a state government as it is short of a majority and other parties refuse to collaborate with it.
Read more:Analysis: Vote gives far-right chance to tighten grip in GermanyExplainer: State votes could act as a bellwether
AfD is strongest in the formerly communist east, and the domestic intelligence agency has the party’s branches in Saxony and Thuringia under official surveillance as “proven right-wing extremist” groups.
Image: A protest in Berlin against the AfD party. Pic: AP
Immigration was pushed to the top of the country’s political agenda after three people were killed in a knife attack by a suspected Islamic extremist at a festival in Solingen, western Germany, on 23 August.
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Hocke, a former history teacher, is a polarising figure who has called Berlin’s memorial to Nazi Germany’s Holocaust of Europe’s Jews a “monument of shame”.
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