GIESSEN, Germany (AP) — Thousands of demonstrators gathered in the western German city of Giessen on Saturday, some clashing with police as the far-right Alternative for Germany’s new youth organization was set to kick off its founding convention.
Groups of protesters blocked or tried to block roads in and around the city of some 93,000 people in the early morning. Police said they used pepper spray after stones were thrown at officers at one location. In another case, police said they used water cannons to clear a blockade by some 2,000 protesters after they ignored calls to leave.
Previous youth organization was dissolved in March
The new youth organization of the anti-immigration Alternative for Germany, or AfD, is to be set up in a meeting at Giessen’s convention center, which had yet to start two hours after the planned time.
Its predecessor, the Young Alternative — a largely autonomous group with relatively loose links to the party — was dissolved at the end of March after AfD decided to formally cut ties with it.
AfD wants to have closer oversight over the new group, expected to be called Generation Germany. The party finished second in Germany’s national election in February with over 20% of the vote and is now the country’s biggest opposition party. It has continued to rise in polls as Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s coalition government has failed to impress voters.
Germany’s domestic intelligence agency had concluded that the Young Alternative was a proven right-wing extremist group. It later classified AfD itself as such a group, but suspended the designation after AfD launched a legal challenge.
In a ruling last year rejecting a call for an injunction against the Young Alternative designation, a Cologne court argued that preserving an ethnically defined German people and the exclusion if possible of the “ethnically foreign” was a central political idea of the group.
It also pointed to agitation against migrants and asylum-seekers, and links with extremist groups such as the Identitarian Movement. In June this year, a higher court ended the appeal process, noting that the Young Alternative had been dissolved.
Party portrays itself as anti-establishment force
It’s typical for German parties to have youth wings, which are generally more politically radical than the parties themselves. It remains to be seen whether the new AfD youth organization will be more moderate than its predecessor, with at least some continuity expected.
Kevin Dorow, a delegate from Germany’s northern Schleswig-Holstein state, said he was previously active in the local branch of the Young Alternative.
“The new formation means above all continuing what the Young Alternative started — being a training ground, attracting young people … and above all bringing them into politics for the good of the party,” in which they could take on offices at some point, he said. He said he hadn’t seen any “drift in a radical direction” in the Young Alternative.
AfD portrays itself as an anti-establishment force at a time of low trust in politicians. It first entered the national parliament in 2017 on the back of discontent with the arrival of large numbers of migrants in the mid-2010s, and curbing migration remains its signature theme. But it has shown a talent for capitalizing on discontent about other issues too in recent years.
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Martin Meissner in Giessen and Geir Moulson in Berlin contributed to this report.
By DANIEL NIEMANN
Associated Press
