Protesters from unions, civil society and left-wing parties aim to disrupt AfD annual conference in Erfurt.<\/p>\n
By AFP, AP, DPA and Reuters<\/p>\n
Published On 4 Jul 20264 Jul 2026<\/p>\n
Thousands of opponents of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party have blocked roads leading to the party\u2019s annual conference ahead of regional elections.<\/p>\n
An estimated 20,000 people flocked to Erfurt, in Thuringia state, on Saturday, according to German police.<\/p>\n
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Protesters from unions, civil society groups and left-wing parties gathered in the centre of the city, some 250km (155 miles) southwest of the capital, Berlin. The police also reported several street blockades.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe want to make it clear that we simply won\u2019t tolerate this, that fascism is on the rise here in Germany,\u201d Georg Becker, a spokesperson for Widersetzen (\u201cResist\u201d), an anti-AfD umbrella group, told the Reuters news agency.<\/p>\n
Large numbers of police, including reinforcements from across Germany, were deployed ahead of the AfD\u2019s two-day conference. Police told the dpa news agency they counted more than 200 buses of protesters arriving in Erfurt.<\/p>\n
Protesters blocked routes into the city, with some abseiling from a motorway bridge. Several groups staged sit-in blockades around the city centre, the AFP news agency said. The Associated Press reported that some protesters clashed with police in riot gear.<\/p>\n
Still, most AfD delegates managed to reach the conference centre where party representatives said the congress began on time\u00a0despite the protests.<\/p>\n
\u2018Anti-democratic\u2019 and \u2018extremist\u2019 views<\/p>\n
AfD became the second largest party in elections last year, scoring the best result for a far-right party since World War II.<\/p>\n
Opinion polls suggest that the party has opened a clear lead over German Chancellor Friedrich \u200cMerz\u2019s \u2060conservatives, partially driven by years of economic stagnation. AfD seems likely to take power at a state level for the first time in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt, paving the way for more success at a national level.<\/p>\n
Although AfD has grown in popularity, it remains controversial. All mainstream parties have ruled out cooperating with AfD over \u201canti-democratic\u201d and \u201cextremist\u201d views.<\/p>\n
AfD has also been monitored by the domestic intelligence agency for several years on suspicion of anti-constitutional activities.<\/p>\n
Protesters in Erfurt want the party banned.<\/p>\n
Noa Sander, another spokesperson for the Resist protest alliance told AFP, \u201cThe AfD wants mass deportations and ethnic cleansing,\u201d in reference to the party\u2019s \u201cremigration\u201d demands.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt should be banned. We intend to do this by blockading their party conference and standing in the way of the AfD, its policies and members wherever they appear, making sure they have no place in society.\u201d Sander said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Protesters from unions, civil society and left-wing parties aim to disrupt AfD annual conference in Erfurt. By AFP,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":48465,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[151,5,42,2491,40392],"class_list":["post-48464","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-germany","tag-europe","tag-germany","tag-news","tag-protests","tag-the-far-right"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48464","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48464"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48464\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48465"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48464"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48464"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48464"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}