Speaking in Munich about today’s AfD party conference in Erfurt and the counter-demonstrations taking place there, Dr Eva Umlauf, an Auschwitz survivor and President of the International Auschwitz Committee, stressed:

‘On this 4 July, we send our greetings to the demonstrators in Erfurt: please make your demonstrations a celebration of diversity, your zest for life and democracy, which stands in stark contrast to the AfD’s policies, its aggression and its fantasies of exclusion. And please, do not resort to violence:

Any use of violence undermines the impact of your presence and your arguments. But I would also like to address the delegates of the AfD: the very fact that you chose the date for your party conference in reference to the NSDAP’s 2nd Reich Party Congress shows us, as victims of National Socialism, just how shamelessly you are inserting yourselves into history – and what we can expect from you.’

And in Berlin, Christoph Heubner, the committee’s Executive Vice-President, added:

‘Will there be delegates at today’s AfD party conference who refuse to accept, and actually oppose the further shift to the right by a party that is already widely regarded as firmly far-right?

Will voters – not just in Saxony-Anhalt – understand, following this party conference, what path this party intends to take Germany down?’