BSW accuses the left of instrumentalizing Nazi crimes

BSW parliamentary group deputy Claudia Wittig has accused Left party group leader Eva von Angern of exploiting National Socialist crimes to escalate party politics. Comparing the AfD politician Tobias Rausch with Hermann Göring crosses a line, Wittig told the German Press Agency. Nazi great Göring was President of the Reichstag from 1932 to 1945.

“The left in particular should know how dangerous it is to make the crimes of National Socialism rhetorical ammunition in day-to-day political business. You can criticize Tobias Rausch harshly and vote against his election,” said historian Wittig. “But putting him in the same row as Hermann Göring blurs historical dimensions and threatens to relativize the very Nazi crimes that we must remember with the greatest seriousness.”

BSW wants to vote for AfD candidate Rausch

After a conversation between the SPD, the Greens, the Left and the BSW, left-wing politician von Angern said on Tuesday: “After Hermann Göring, the first president of a parliament should not come from a right-wing extremist party here in Saxony-Anhalt.” The SPD also uses similar words in a call for a rally. «The first right-wing extremist parliamentary speaker since Hermann Göring? Not with us,” it says in an Instagram post.

«Goering was part of the leadership of a criminal regime that spread war and destruction across Europe. The Second World War cost tens of millions of lives worldwide, and six million Jews were murdered in the Holocaust. This dimension prohibits frivolous historical equations,” said Wittig.

The state parliament will be constituted in Magdeburg on Tuesday. Then the presidium should be re-elected. The AfD MP Tobias Rausch would like to become President of the State Parliament; the AfD parliamentary group has nominated him unanimously. The BSW wants to vote for Rausch.