Key facts
- Heidenau, a town near Dresden, has voted to halt future installations of "Stolpersteine" plaques.
- The decision was a result of a motion by the AfD and CDU.
- Supporters argued the plaques are inappropriate as they are embedded in the ground and can be walked on.
- The city administration had recommended against a blanket ban on future "Stolpersteine".
- Charlotte Knobloch, head of a Jewish regional association in Bavaria, expressed dismay at the decision.
An East German town has approved a motion to reject the future installation of brass plaques commemorating victims of Nazi persecution, a decision that has ignited debate over mainstream parties' adherence to a pact ruling out cooperation with the far-right AfD.
In Heidenau, a town near Dresden in the eastern state of Saxony, the town council voted to stop further "Stolpersteine" plaques and to concentrate future commemorations at a memorial site in the town's northern cemetery. The motion was supported by the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) and the ruling center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU).
The decision comes as the AfD tops national polls ahead of Chancellor Friedrich Merz's CDU. The AfD has frequently challenged Germany's Holocaust remembrance, with co-founder Alexander Gauland once describing the Nazi era as merely "bird shit" in an otherwise successful 1,000 years of German history.
Supporters of the motion argued that many residents found the cobblestone-shaped "Stolpersteine" inappropriate because they are embedded in the ground and can be walked on. However, the city administration had recommended against the ban, stating that it was neither necessary for the creation of a central memorial nor justified by the proposal itself.
Charlotte Knobloch, the head of a Jewish regional association in Bavaria, told the Funke group of newspapers that she was "appalled that a democratic party has chosen to support such a transparent manoeuvre by the extremist AfD."