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What German elections show about people’s attitude towards immigration

The German people, like many other people in Europe, seem not to approve the way politicians have handled immigration, Douglas Murray, author of “The Strange Death of Europe” has said.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel
German Chancellor Angela Merkel

In a radio interview with Julia Hartley-Brewer of Talkradio.co.uk he said most people in every country in Europe believe their government has handled the migration situation badly.

Mr Murray had predicted the rise of the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party which came third in the recent German elections.

“The publics of Europe are remarkably consistent and indeed uniform on the question of migration,” he said, stressing that the message they are sending to their politicians is: “we don’t like what you’ve been doing.”

“The German public were told by Angela Merkel in 2015, basically, that there was no alternative to her policy of adding 2% to the population in a single year alone,” Mr Murray said. “She basically said ‘there is no alternative. We have to open our doors, we have to let the world in.’

“The German people in significant numbers said, ‘no there is an alternative, and it’s called Alternative for Deutschland.'”

He added that such a vote was entirely predictable since the Alternative for Deutschland had already entered most of the regional assemblies in Germany, it had “even beaten Angela Merkel’s party to third place in her own constituency last year.”