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from.– NAZI Legitimacy?
Germany: Far-right party skips
Auschwitz tribute
By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Legislators for a German far-right party walked out of the Saxony state
parliament Friday to protest a moment of silence honoring victims of
Nazi aggression.
All 12 members of the National Democratic Party stood up and headed for
the door after state parliament president Erich Iltgen called on
legislators to "join me in remembering the victims of National Socialist
violence in a dignified way."
Iltgen called the moment of silence to mark the 60th anniversary of the
liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp on Thursday, as well as
those who died in the Allied bombing of Dresden, the capital of the
eastern state. The parliament will be in recess during both
anniversaries on Thursday and Feb. 13, respectively.
The far-right party, known by its German initials NPD, won 9.2 percent
representation in Saxony's state parliament in elections last year,
capitalizing on discontent with Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's drive to
cut social programs.
A government attempt to outlaw the NPD, accused of fomenting hate crimes
against foreigners and Jews, failed in 2003. Germany's supreme court
threw out the case after it emerged that the government's evidence was
partly based on statements by paid informants.
The party has no national presence, but it said earlier this month that
it had signed a cooperation deal with the right-wing German People's
Union aimed at rallying voters for national parliamentary elections next
year and beyond.
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