Verdict: AFD members may not own firearms

Published 5 July 2024 at 11.50

Foreign. Members of Alternative for Germany in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia are banned by a court from carrying firearms.

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Alternative for Germany, AFD, is now one of the largest parties in Germany.

Despite this, the other parties want to ban the immigration-critical challenger, and the German establishment is doing everything to destroy the AFD's supporters.

The latest example comes from North Rhine-Westphalia, which is the most populous state in Germany. The administrative court in Düsseldorf has now decided that AFD members in the state do not have the right to carry firearms.

The judgment refers to the fact that the German intelligence service BFV classified the party as a “suspected” threat to “democracy”.< /p>

The case involved a married couple who owned over 200 firearms and had permits for this. However, their permit was revoked due to their membership in the AFD. The couple first sued the authorities and lost. Now the party has also lost in a higher instance – the court claims that AFD members are suspected of unconstitutional activities and therefore “unreliable” according to current gun laws.

The ruling means that the married couple must either hand over their firearms to the authorities or destroy both the weapons and any ammunition. The husband owns 197 firearms and the wife 27. However, the court still allows the case to proceed after an appeal to the state supreme court in Münster, “due to the fundamental importance of the case”.

BFV is a highly politicized intelligence service that targets itself on domestic “threats” to the US-imposed constitutional order in Germany. Critics claim it is designed to stifle political opposition to the left-liberal regime. The spy agency is currently surveilling AFD members in a number of states, including wiretapping their phones and Internet communications — all without a search warrant.

It is unclear how the current ruling, if later upheld by the Supreme Court in Münster, will affect military and police officers who regularly handle firearms.