Germany’s far-right party bans its top EU election candidate from campaigning after Nazi remark

BERLIN (AP) — Germany’s far-right Alternative for Germany party on Wednesday banned its top candidate in next month’s European elections from making any further appearances during the campaign and said he would immediately resign from the council. party administration.

The public demotion came after Maximilian Krah told an Italian newspaper that not all members of the elite Nazi SS unit, implicated in major war crimes during World War II, were criminals. war.

Krah, 47, was already under surveillance after Brussels authorities raided his European Parliament offices in connection with one of his aides arrested last month on suspicion of spying for China.

German media claimed that Krah himself had links to China and also to Russia.

The scandals involving Krah come at a very inopportune time for the Alternative for Germany, or AfD – just weeks before the party hopes to make big gains in the European elections. He led the polls last year, but became less popular this year after millions of Germans protested his radical far-right stance.

In addition to Krah, no. The number two on the AfD’s list for the European Parliament elections, Petr Bystron, last month denied allegations in a Czech daily that he may have received money from a pro-Russian network.

The AfD’s top board said in a statement after an emergency meeting on Krah’s recent missteps that the current election campaign had caused “massive damage to the party, including the main candidate had provided a pretext”.

Krah takes full responsibility and will resign from his position on the federal executive council with immediate effect. It was not immediately clear whether he was still a candidate for the European Parliament.

The party’s latest crisis was triggered by an interview Krah gave last week to the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, in which he said: “I will never say that anyone who wears an SS uniform is automatically a criminal,” reported the German press agency dpa.

When asked if the SS were war criminals, he replied: “There was certainly a high percentage of criminals, but not all of them were criminals.” »

In response to the interview, French far-right leader Marine Le Pen of the National Rally said Krah had crossed the red line. Until now, the National Rally (RN) worked with the AfD in the European Parliament, but the French far right is now considering ending its cooperation with the AfD at the European level, dpa reported.

“I think that the AfD, with which we have been collaborating for five years in the European Parliament, has crossed lines which for me are red lines,” declared Jordan Bardella, leader of the RN party, on TF1.