Berlin - German officials began a legal process yesterday that could lead to a fringe far-right party being outlawed as a neo-Nazi threat to democracy.
But the National Democratic Party said it would fight a ban in the courts and draw inspiration from the electoral successes of other right-wing movements in Europe, such as Austria's Freedom Party. It distanced itself from Germany's Nazi past.
Amid public anger over racist violence sparked by a bomb attack two weeks ago, senior officials from the Interior Ministry in Berlin and their counterparts from Germany's 16 federal states met for the first time yesterday. The government has asked them to recommend whether it should ask the Constitutional Court to outlaw the NPD.
