When the world gets closer.

We help you see farther.

Sign up to our expressly international daily newsletter.

Germany

German Activists Compare European Fiscal Pact To Infamous Nazi Law

The approval of European bailout measures has been widely criticized. But a German branch of the global activist group Attac went the next step, comparing the fiscal response to a 1933 law that paved the way for Hitler's regime.

Hitler's Reichstag speech in 1933 promoting the bill (German Federal Archives)
Hitler's Reichstag speech in 1933 promoting the bill (German Federal Archives)

BERLIN - Condemnation has spread in Germany over a left-wing activist group's campaign that compares the European bailout agreement to the 1933 law that paved the way for Adolf Hitler's dictatorship.

The Aachen regional group of the international global justice movement Attac sent out postcards in which the euro zone's European Stability Mechanism (ESM) and fiscal pact were compared to the 1933 Nazi Enabling Act.

Kerstin Griese, a Social Democratic Party (SPD) member of Germany's federal parliament, told Die Welt that the the Attac campaign attack demonstrated a lack of historical knowledge and "banalizes Nazi terror."

Even opponents of the fiscal pact disapproved of the comparison. "One should always ask oneself if historical comparisons --particularly with German history-- are helpful," Free Democratic Party (FDP) parliamentarian Frank Schäffler, who is known as the "Euro Rebel," told Die Welt: "I believe such comparisons are wrong."

The national Attac group has distanced itself from the campaign in Aachen, in western Germany, which was conducted without consulting them, spokeswoman Frauke Distelrath said. She added that he believed "the comparison to 1933 is incorrect..."

Distelrath said that although the German federal parliament's approval last Friday of the fiscal pact put Germany "on a course to a new order that we do not consider legitimate" and as such is a "frightening precedent," the situation cannot be compared to 1933.

Attac has 27,000 members in Germany. The organization is structured in such a way that regional groups largely act autonomously.

The so-called Enabling Act (officially, the "Law to Remedy the Distress of the People and the Nation") passed on March 24, 1933 effectively made it possible for Hitler to pass laws without their being approved by parliament.

Read the full story in German by Miriam Hollstein

Photo - German Federal Archives

*This is a digest item, not a direct translation

You've reached your limit of free articles.

To read the full story, start your free trial today.

Get unlimited access. Cancel anytime.

Exclusive coverage from the world's top sources, in English for the first time.

Insights from the widest range of perspectives, languages and countries.

FOCUS: Russia-Ukraine War

That Man In Mariupol: Is Putin Using A Body Double To Avoid Public Appearances?

Putin really is meeting with Xi in Moscow — we know that. But there are credible experts saying that the person who showed up in Mariupol the day before was someone else — the latest report that the Russian president uses a doppelganger for meetings and appearances.

screen grab of Putin in a dark down jacket

During the visit to Mariupol, the Presidential office only released screen grabs of a video

Russian President Press Office/TASS via ZUMA
Anna Akage

Have no doubt, the Vladimir Putin we’re seeing alongside Xi Jinping this week is the real Vladimir Putin. But it’s a question that is being asked after a range of credible experts have accused the Russian president of sending a body double for a high-profile visit this past weekend in the occupied Ukrainian city of Mariupol.

Stay up-to-date with the latest on the Russia-Ukraine war, with our exclusive international coverage.

Sign up to our free daily newsletter.

Reports and conspiracy theories have circulated in the past about the Russian leader using a stand-in because of health or security issues. But the reaction to the Kremlin leader's trip to Mariupol is the first time that multiple credible sources — including those who’ve spent time with him in the past — have cast doubt on the identity of the man who showed up in the southeastern Ukrainian city that Russia took over last spring after a months-long siege.

Russian opposition politician Gennady Gudkov is among those who confidently claim that a Putin look-alike, or rather one of his look-alikes, was in the Ukrainian city.

"Now that there is a war going on, I don't rule out the possibility that someone strongly resembling or disguised as Putin is playing his role," Gudkov said.

Keep reading...Show less

You've reached your limit of free articles.

To read the full story, start your free trial today.

Get unlimited access. Cancel anytime.

Exclusive coverage from the world's top sources, in English for the first time.

Insights from the widest range of perspectives, languages and countries.

The latest