Updated 03.51 | Published 02.46
The right-wing nationalist party Alternative for Germany (AFD) takes its first post as mayor, while support for the party increases in opinion polls.
In the city of Pirna in Saxony, with around 40,000 inhabitants, Tim Lochner won Sunday’s election. Lochner received 38.5 percent of the vote, according to the first count. He belongs to the city board’s AFD group, but is not a member of the party.
AFD’s group leader in the Bundestag, Alice Weidel, hails X’s victory as a “historic result”.
Just a few days earlier, the AFD had been deemed an extremist organization by German intelligence, citing the party’s opposition to immigrants and attempts to weaken democracy.
In the latest opinion polls, the party has received support of 22 percent at the national level.
This summer, another AFD politician, Hannes Loth, was elected mayor of the town of Raguhn-Jessnitz with just under 9,000 inhabitants. It is also located in the region of Saxony-Anhalt.