A leader of the scandal-plagued far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) attacked similar European parties on Saturday after the AfD was expelled from his group in the European Parliament.
In a coup ahead of next month’s EU-wide elections, the AfD was this week expelled from the Identity and Democracy (ID) group, an alliance of right-wing populist parties in parliament.
AfD co-leader Tino Chrupalla attacked Marine Le Pen’s far-right party in France and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. He said he would not allow them to influence AfD policies.
Le Pen’s National Rally is a member of the ID group. The party quickly began to distance itself from the AfD after Maximilian Krah, an AfD candidate for the European Parliament, said that not all SS members were criminals.
The Schutzstaffel (SS) was an important paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Krah’s Nazi comments were published in Italian media earlier this month.
Chrupalla characterized Meloni, one of Europe’s most powerful far-right figures, as actually a moderate pushing Brussels’ agenda. He stated that since Meloni took office in 2022, she has turned in favor of more migration and sending weapons to Ukraine.
“This melonization will not happen to us,” Chrupalla said at an AfD party conference in the eastern city of Glauchau.
The AfD will not bend over backwards to make itself more respectable to others, he said: “For us, German interests always come first.”
In addition to the SS comments, Krah’s ties to Russia have come under media scrutiny and his former assistant was arrested last month on suspicion of spying for China.
Still, Chrupalla played down the AfD’s exclusion from the EU parliamentary group as a “minor crisis” and said the party, which remains Germany’s second most popular in polls, had been through worse.
The AfD’s other co-leader, Alice Weidel, struck a less combative tone at an event on the other side of the country.
“The week we have had has not been good. We have entered into turmoil with an unpleasant outcome,” she said on Saturday in the western city of Marl.
“These days, these moments when things are not going so well are always an opportunity to learn lessons so that we can continue to grow and become even more professional,” Weidel told around 800 party supporters.
