Germany / 14-08-2011
German neo-Nazis under fire for 'step on the gas' election slogan
Berlin - The electioneering materials, produced for Berlin state elections in September, depict Udo Voigt, the leader of the Germany's far-Right National Democratic Party (NPD) sitting on his motorcycle.
Smiling and wearing a black leather jacket Mr. Voight's hand grips his bike's throttle with the words "gas geben". The phrase normally means, "step on it" or speed up but has much controversial associations for a party closed linked to neo-Nazis.
Andreas Gram, a senior Christian Democrat politician in Berlin, attacked the "right-wing extremist" NPD for openly making an "association with the gas chambers" that killed millions of Jews in Nazi death camps.
Over 20,000 copies of the campaign posters have been distributed around Berlin, where Mr Voigt, the NPD's number one candidate and member of the district council in the Treptow - Köpenick district, is standing.
Klaus Wowereit, Berlin's mayor, said that there was nothing the authorities could do while the far-Right NPD remains a legal party.
