In Germany, which was shocked by the attempted coup, a call to ‘protect parliament more’

There are growing calls for greater protection from the Bundestag, after people accused of plotting a coup in Germany are linked to the far-right Alternative Party for Germany (AfD).

Speaking to Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland (German Publishing Network), Green Party MP Konstantin von Notz stated that the Bundestag security concept was not created so that “enemies of the constitution with access privileges” could be elected to parliament. and said: “We must increase the protection order of the Bundestag without sabotaging the daily life of the democrat deputies.”

Social Democratic Party member Sebastian Hartmann Funke told the media: “After the arrest of a former AfD deputy who wanted to storm the Federal Assembly, his current contacts in parliament must be urgently reviewed.” “We will carefully examine what security measures we need to adapt for the Federal Assembly and will consider the issue in all decision-making bodies,” Funke’s deputy chair of the Federal Assembly, Katrin Göring-Eckardt, told the media.

In a statement yesterday, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz pointed to links between the coup plotters and the far-right AfD. Social Democratic Party co-chair Lars Klingbeil also called for the far-right AfD party to be punished. Defining the AfD as an openly anti-constitutional party, Klingbeil said: “The AfD should be on the watch list of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, not in parliaments, courts or public services.” (AA)