AfD party's landslide win in eastern Germany tests country's 'firewall' against the far right

BERLIN (AP) — Alternative for Germany, or AfD, has established itself as a significant political force in the 13 years since its founding, but it has never been part of any state or federal government. That’s a result of what is often called a “firewall” against cooperation with the anti-immigrant, far-right party.

That firewall faces its biggest test after AfD won a landslide victory in Sunday’s election in the eastern German state of Saxony-Anhalt.

Germany's mainstream parties have long said they would not work with Alternative for Germany, which is classified by Germany’s domestic intelligence agency as an extremist group in some regions of the country — including the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt. Any dealing by mainstream parties with AfD is particularly sensitive in view of Germany’s Nazi past.

Many Germans had believed their country had developed an immunity to nationalism and assertions of racial superiority after confronting the horrors of its Nazi past through education and laws to outlaw persecution.

But as it turns out, that conviction was mistaken, and similar to voters across Europe and elsewhere, voters in Germany are increasingly empowering the extreme far-right party.

AfD has rejected any accusations of being undemocratic or even anti-constitutional and has repeatedly pushed back against the firewall.

The firewall taboo has sometimes forced other parties into unusual alliances to keep AfD out of power — for instance, a three-party coalition straddling ideological divisions that governs the eastern state of Thuringia since AfD emerged as the strongest party for the first time in a regional election there two years ago.

In Germany’s national election last year, AfD achieved the best showing by a far-right party since World War II and became the strongest political force in parts of the country. AfD became the biggest opposition party in parliament after Chancellor Friedrich Merz's center-right Christian Democrats upheld the firewall and formed an unpopular coalition with the center-left Social Democrats.

AfD won 43.8% of the vote in Sunday's election, more than double its showing five years ago in the state, while Merz's party lost about half its support.

Merz has strictly rejected any kind of cooperation with AfD in the past and top officials reiterated that stance on Sunday. But other parties in the newly elected state parliament may be less likely to keep up the firewall.

The AfD candidate for governor, Ulrich Siegmund, aims to become the first far-right head of a state government and has already said he will reach out to all other parties and individual lawmakers to assemble a governing majority.

While Siegmund has rejected an AfD minority government, his party could possibly govern with the hard-left BSW party, which received 5.3% of the vote. The two parties share a Russia-friendly course and oppose immigration but do not agree on some other subjects.

On Monday, BSW’s lead candidate in the election, Thomas Schulze, expressed his party’s willingness to help an AfD governor take office in the state parliament.

Forming a government that excludes the AfD would only be possible if all the other parties that were elected worked together — CDU, Social Democrats, the Greens, the Left Party, and the BSW. However, a coalition involving five partners would be extremely unusual, very complicated and prone to instability.

It’s also possible that newly elected lawmakers from other parties could defect to AfD — it would only need three people to get a majority to govern.

Political analyst Volker Resing said AfD may be able to overcome the firewall after its strong showing in Saxony-Anhalt, with BSW potentially serving as the kingmaker.

“This tiny party could now play a decisive role in determining the future of Saxony-Anhalt," he told The Associated Press.

Resing said “it is still unclear” whether the parties will join forces based on their common view toward Russia to overcome the firewall and succeed in forming Germany’s first far-right state government since the end of the Nazi era.

Co-leaders of Alternative for Germany party, or AfD, Alice Weidel, right, and Tino Chrupalla, left, and top candidate for the Saxony-Anhalt state elections Ulrich Siegmund, center, attend a press conference in Berlin, Germany, Monday, Sept. 7, 2026. (Bernd von Jutrczenka/dpa via AP)

From left, Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Sven Schulze, Minister-President of Saxony-Anhalt and state chairman of the CDU in Saxony-Anhalt, his party's top candidate for the state election on Sept. 6, and Karin Prien, Federal Minister of Education, Family, Senior Citizens, Women, and Youth, and Deputy Chair of the CDU Federal Executive Committee, attend the meeting of the CDU Federal Executive Committee at the Konrad Adenauer House, in Berlin, Monday, Sept. 7, 2026. (Michael Kappeler/dpa via AP)

Chancellor Friedrich Merz is sitting in a meeting of the CDU Federal Executive Committee at the Konrad Adenauer House, in Berlin, Monday, Sept. 7, 2026, the day after AfD stunning success in elections. (Michael Kappeler/dpa via AP)

Co-leaders of Alternative for Germany party, or AfD, Alice Weidel, center, and Tino Chrupalla, right, and top candidate for the Saxony-Anhalt state elections Ulrich Siegmund, left, leave a press conference in Berlin, Germany, Monday, Sept. 7, 2026. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)

Co-leader of Alternative for Germany party, or AfD, Alice Weidel, leaves for a press conference in Berlin, Germany, Monday, Sept. 7, 2026. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)

PARIS (AP) — Four people including two men linked with France’s extreme right stood trial in Paris on Monday over the killing of former Argentina rugby player Federico Martín Aramburú.

The trial took place more than four years after Aramburú was shot dead in March 2022 and a verdict is set for Sept. 25.

Loïk Le Priol, 32, is being prosecuted for murder, while Romain Bouvier, 35, faced charges of attempted murder. They face the possibility of life imprisonment.

Bouvier and then Le Priol gave their names to the court at shortly after 2:40 p.m. local time at the Palais de Justice in Paris.

The 42-year-old Aramburú, who played 22 times for Argentina, was killed when leaving a bar in Paris along with his friend Shaun Hegarty, a former New Zealand rugby player. They had traveled to the capital to attend a Six Nations Championship match.

Le Priol’s former girlfriend, 29-year-old Lyson Rochemir, who drove Bouvier to the scene of the shooting, faced a possible life sentence for complicity in attempted murder. She was also present on Monday.

A fourth defendant faced up to three years in prison for concealing evidence in order to protect one of the shooters.

Bouvier and Le Priol had been banned from seeing each other following their convictions for aggravated assault against a former president of a far-right student association in 2015. As members of the same organization, they said they had wanted to humiliate him because he “boasted about having assaulted women.”

On March 19, 2022, shortly after 5 a.m., the two former rugby players arrived at a bar in Paris’s Latin Quarter, Le Mabillon. They sat at a table next to the one occupied by the far-right activists. Everyone was under the influence of alcohol, the investigation showed.

Although the initial conversation appeared cordial, things quickly deteriorated and insults were exchanged. Le Priol allegedly told Aramburú: “You’re going to shut up, otherwise I’ll shoot you and then I’ll (expletive) your mother.” The defendants dispute that these words were spoken.

A fight then broke out. The bar’s bouncer intervened, and at around 6 a.m., the two groups went separate ways. According to witnesses, the two far-right activists were “furious.”

Together with Le Priol’s former girlfriend, who was driving their Jeep car, they set off in search of the rugby players, according to Le Priol, in order to “sort things out.”

Surveillance footage showed the two former rugby players walking down the street toward their hotel. Hegarty had stopped to get some ice cubes to relieve the injuries he had sustained during the fight at the bar.

Bouvier was the first to spot them while he was in the Jeep with Rochemir. He fired four shots at Aramburú, two of which struck and wounded him. Le Priol then arrived running and fired six shots into his back. Four hit him, two of them fatally. The Argentine collapsed into Hegarty’s arms.

Le Priol and Bouvier admitted firing the shots but deny having any intention to kill. Le Priol described his actions as “a pure reflex,” explaining that he “wasn’t himself,” that he “wasn’t there,” and that he “was in Africa.”

A former soldier, he had served in Mali, Niger and Djibouti, where he allegedly strangled and assaulted a prostitute. He was repatriated to France in 2015 because of a post-traumatic disorder, and his military contract was terminated in 2017 after he was charged with aggravated assault in connection with the October 2015 incident.

From the very first day, investigators knew who was responsible for Aramburu’s death, as the events had been captured by several surveillance cameras.

Rochemir was arrested on the same day, March 19. Le Priol was arrested three days later while attempting to cross the border between Hungary and Ukraine. Bouvier was arrested on Oct. 23, 2022, in Sablé-sur-Sarthe, in Western France.

Aramburú, married and the father of three, settled in the French Basque Country at the end of his career in 2012, having played for Biarritz, Perpignan, Dax and Glasgow in Scotland.

He helped Argentina finish third at the 2007 Rugby World Cup.

Last Saturday, Argentina’s players warmed up before a match against Australia wearing T-shirts with “Justicia por Fede” (Justice for Fede) written on them in his memory. Argentina’s rugby federation also called for justice to be served.

See AP’s full rugby coverage here

Argentin's captain Pablo Matera, wearing a T-shirt that read in Spanish, "Justice for Fede," in memory of former rugby player Federico Martín Aramburú, who was murdered in Paris, France on March 19, 2022, prior a rugby test match between Argentina and Australia in Mendoza, Argentina, Saturday, Sept. 5, 2026. (AP Photo/Gustavo Garello)

File - Argentina's Federico Martin Aramburu, center, runs with the ball during their Rugby World Cup Group D match between Argentina and Georgia, in Lyon, France, on Sept.11, 2007. (AP Photo/Mark Baker, File)