Germany’s Merz accuses AfD of promoting ‘ethnic cleansing’

BERLIN

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz delivers a speech on the 2027 budget bill at the Bundestag. (AFP Photo)

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz labeled the far-right Alternative for Germany’s (AfD) demand for mass “remigration” a form of “ethnic cleansing by skin color and origin” in a heated parliamentary exchange on Sept. 9.

Three days after the AfD scored a crushing election victory over his centre-right CDU in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt, Merz and AfD co-leader Alice Weidel sharply attacked each other in the assembly.

Merz took aim at the AfD’s demand for mass deportations of rejected asylum seekers and people arriving via irregular channels.

“The word ‘remigration’ is nothing other than a synonym for ethnic cleansing,” Merz said about the AfD’s flagship policy.

“Remigration is nothing other than ethnic cleansing by skin colour and origin,” he added to howls of protest from AfD deputies in the Bundestag.

The AfD took almost 44 percent of the vote in Sept. 6 election, against 17 percent for the CDU.

The AfD, which fell three seats short of an absolute majority, said it was now in talks with other groups and MPs in an effort to form a state government.

The rise of the AfD has unnerved many who feel Germany has a special responsibility to atone for its Nazi past.

Weidel took to the lectern first, declaring that the days of Merz’s coalition “are over.”

People wanted “a change of course in politics at last, and they don’t want ‘business as usual,’” she said.

She also denounced the government’s immigration policy, saying it had made Germany unsafe.

“German citizens have to live with the daily consequences of mass migration,” she said.

“With knife violence every day, attacks on trains and in stations, with run-down and threatening cityscapes.”