![Higher Administrative Court of North Rhine-Westphalia - Verdict pronounced in the proceedings initiated by the Alternative for Germany (AfD) against the Federal Republic of Germany, represented by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution. View of the bench after entry of the court. In the middle (3rd from left) Dr Gerald Buck, presiding judge at the Higher Administrative Court. Münster, North Rhine-Westphalia, DEU, Germany, 13 May 2024. Photo: IMAGO / Rüdiger Wölk Higher Administrative Court of North Rhine-Westphalia - Verdict pronounced in the proceedings initiated by the Alternative for Germany (AfD) against the Federal Republic of Germany, represented by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution. View of the bench after entry of the court. In the middle (3rd from left) Dr Gerald Buck, presiding judge at the Higher Administrative Court. Münster, North Rhine-Westphalia, DEU, Germany, 13 May 2024. Photo: IMAGO / Rüdiger Wölk](typo3temp/pics/ccfbd8c3f3.jpg)
Higher Administrative Court of North Rhine-Westphalia - Verdict pronounced in the proceedings initiated by the Alternative for Germany (AfD) against the Federal Republic of Germany, represented by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution. View of the bench after entry of the court. In the middle (3rd from left) Dr Gerald Buck, presiding judge at the Higher Administrative Court. Münster, North Rhine-Westphalia, DEU, Germany, 13 May 2024. Photo: IMAGO / Rüdiger Wölk
In Berlin, Christoph Heubner, Executive Vice President of the International Auschwitz Committee, commented on today's ruling by the Münster Higher Administrative Court in the case of AfD vs. the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV):
"Holocaust survivors are extremely grateful to the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) for its work over the past months. It has been closely monitoring the activities of sections of the AfD and has provided transparent, publicly communicated assessments of these activities. These observations have verified the development of large parts of the party as "unequivocally far-right".
All in all this has provided Holocaust survivors with important, exemplary proof of a robust, defensive democracy at all levels. Today's ruling by the judges in Münster, has impressively confirmed the professional approach in the work of the president of the BfV, Thomas Haldewang, and his colleagues. The judges have once again provided a clear picture of the AfD and shown the public the exact nature of the party’s extreme right-wing world of exclusion, brutalization and conspiracy, and where the journey with the AfD will end. Following this verdict all such members of parliament will have to face up to questions about this situation which will now hopefully come to an end. All of them are accountable for the entire course of their party as well as for the division into those who, seemingly benign and detached, sit in talk shows, and those who manipulate the brown strings in the background.