“If there is one thing the Left should be able to do, it would be political cleansing.”

The North Rhine-Westphalian Minister for European and Federal Affairs, Nathanael Liminski, has recommended the left in Berlin carry out “political cleansing” within its own ranks.

“Jew-haters and clan friends should not be treated with any self-help groups, but should be excluded from democratic parties,” said the head of the North Rhine-Westphalia State Chancellery at the Germany Day of the Junge Union (JU) in Bonn. Anyone who can't do that has no place in a government, "but is a case for the Office for the Protection of the Constitution."

When the Left says that expelling extremist or problematic members is not easy, he responds: “If there is one thing that this party, The Left, with its origins in Stalinism, should be able to do, it would be political cleansing,” said Liminski. “But they can’t get it together now.”

Liminski was alluding to the so-called purges under Soviet dictator Josef Stalin, who was in power in Moscow from the mid-1920s until his death in 1953. During his reign there were several waves of bloody repression. The largest ran from 1936 to 1938 and was called the Great Terror or, more trivially, the Stalinist purges.

“Morally sublime weirdos”

North Rhine-Westphalia State Chancellor Liminski denied the Left in Berlin any credibility for democracy. “Morally elevated weirdos turn themselves into the useful idiots of tough extremists, and this should then be moderated away in working groups.”

Liminski is considered an influential political strategist in North Rhine-Westphalia who, as head of the State Chancellery, plays a key role for Prime Minister Hendrik Wüst (CDU).

Chancellor warns against collaboration with the left

Previously, at the JU Germany Day in Berlin, Chancellor Friedrich Merz (CDU) had urgently warned the SPD and the Greens against collaborating with the left in the capital.

Four weeks after the election to the Berlin House of Representatives, the Left, the Greens and the SPD successfully concluded their exploratory talks on Saturday. The German Press Agency learned from circles of all three parties involved that the party committees are now being proposed to start coalition negotiations.