German court fines AfD's Höcke over 2nd use of Nazi slogan
A court has fined the far-right Alternative for Germany politician Björn Höcke — for a second time in two months — over his use of a Nazi slogan at a political rally.
The public prosecutor's office had accused Höcke of knowingly using the phrase on both occasions
A regional court in the eastern German city of Halle on Monday sentenced Alternative for Germany (AfD) politician Höcke to a fine for repeated his use of a Nazi-era phrase.
The court ruled that Höcke, 52, must pay 130 daily rates of €130 ($140) each — totaling €16,900.
Prosecutors alleged that Björn Höcke had been testing the boundaries when he uttered the first two words of the slogan "Everything for Germany" and goaded the crowd to complete it.
In May, Höcke — leader of the AfD in the Germany state of Thüringia — was fined €13,000 ($13,900) by the same court for the original offense of using the phrase at an event in Merseburg in May 2021.
His words were deemed to break Germany's law against using symbols of unconstitutional and terrorist organizations.
The saying was a slogan of the Nazi Sturmabteilung (SA), or stormtroopers, who played a major role when Adolf Hitler and his Nazi party came to power in 1933. In this early phase, the SA terrorized Germany, killing, torturing, and intimidating mainly communists and Jews.
rc/msh (AFP, dpa)