Alice Weidel, co-leader of Alternative for Germany (AfD) on Tuesday criticized her party colleagues for agreeing to travel to Russia as the far-right party faces allegations of possible espionage for the Kremlin.
Several AfD politicians announced plans to attend a symposium in the Russian Black Sea resort of Sochi this week, drawing extensive criticism in Germany given Moscow’s hostile relations with the country.
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“I cannot understand what they are actually supposed to do there, to put it bluntly,” Weidel told reporters.
Last week, a lawmaker for German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s party accused the AfD of harboring a Russian “sleeper cell” in the Bundestag on Wednesday, AFP reported.
Marc Henrichmann, a lawmaker for Merz’s center-right Christian Democratic Union for Germany (CDU), drew attention to the fact that AfD party members have asked parliamentary questions about arms deliveries to Ukraine, power stations, drone production and army bases in recent months.
“At the very least, they have a sleeper cell loyal to Russia in their ranks,” he said. “How lucky for Vladimir Putin that the AfD exists in Germany.”
In those visits, the legislators allegedly had plans for a meeting with Dmitry Medvedev, a mercurial former Russian president and current deputy chair of the Security Council, dubbed the “Herald of the Apocalypse.”
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Those visits have since been forbidden by AfD leaders.
Weidel, who has sought to make the AfD a major force in German politics, defended the party’s more open stance toward Russia but said there is very little to be gained from the Sochi visit.
AFP reported that one AfD MP, Rainer Rothfuss, had been talked out of the trip, Weidel said. Another, Steffen Kotre, has stuck to his plans.
“The process must be clearly structured, because things cannot continue like this in the future,” Weidel said. “There is a great deal of dissatisfaction, precisely because these trips serve no purpose whatsoever.”
