Turning back time

If you could go back in time and ban the Nazi party, would you? Especially given all you now know about the misery the German political party would cause before and during a world war.

- Cathrin Schaer

It sounds like a rather thrilling premise. Back to the Future 4: Marty McFly versus Adolf and his evil henchmen! But in fact, it's a question far less adventurous German politicians, lawyers, journalists and judges have been debating for almost a year now.

Things escalated last month, when one of the country’s domestic intelligence agencies classified a local political party, the Alternative for Germany or AfD, as “right-wing extremist”. It’s seen as a possible first step towards an outright ban. Because of Germany’s history, local law can be used to outlaw political parties that seek to undermine or abolish democracy.

But it’s actually very difficult to make those bans stick. The AfD took court action which led to the designation being suspended until judges could review the spy agency's 1100-page report, something that might take a while.

This month, another similar incident around an AfD-supporting publication called Compact also returned to court.

In July last year, the Ministry of the Interior banned