Politician from German right-wing AfD party arrested

GENEVA

A politician of the radical right-wing party AfD was arrested on Monday not far from the southern German city of Stuttgart, local prosecutors confirmed to the media.

Daniel Halemba, who was wanted by an arrest warrant, is accused by Wurzburg prosecutors of public incitement and using signs of anti-constitutional organizations.

Halemba, an AfD deputy in the Bavarian parliament, has been a member of the student association Teutonia Prague Wurzburg since 2021, which was raided by police in September.

According to prosecutors, there were suspicions that objects with signs of Hitler's Nazi Party as well as racist stickers and writings were found in the fraternity house. The seized items have now almost all been evaluated, a spokesman for prosecutors told local media on Monday.

Halemba is to be brought before a judge in Wurzburg as soon as possible, who could order pre-trial detention. His lawyer has filed an appeal against the arrest warrant.

The anti-immigrant AfD is polling between 19% and 23% in Germany in recent polls, making it the second-strongest force in Germany after the conservative CDU.

For the AfD, asylum and immigration are the key issues that helped it achieve electoral success shortly after the party was founded in 2013.

The party made strong gains in the last state elections earlier this month in the German states of Bavaria and Hesse, and is now the strongest opposition party in both states.

Germany's domestic intelligence service has juged the AfD a suspected anti-constitutional threat that can be put under surveillance.