Rebellious youth wing of Germany's AfD gathers before key election

The youth wing of the Alternative for Germany party was gathering for a national congress on Saturday, ahead of a key election in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt that could see the far-right AfD take power for the first time.

At the event in the eastern city of Magdeburg, the Generation Deutschland (GD) youth organization aims to define its stance on European policy and, in doing so, to distance itself from the parent party's line.

Its lead candidate for the Saxony-Anhalt election, Ulrich Siegmund, was also expected to attend.

According to a spokesman, 480 participants, guests and journalists were invited to GD's second national congress.

The police put the number of the group's own participants at 300, while counter-demonstrations on Saturday remained limited in scale, with the police citing around 250 participants before the start of the event.

Prior to the congress, GD leader Jean-Pascal Hohm had poured cold water on the AfD's strict anti-euro stance, which party leader Alice Weidel has also publicly advocated to date.

"We do not want Germany to leave the euro, but rather to rectify the existing structural flaws in the euro system," Hohm told the Bild tabloid. The organization also rejects the idea of Germany leaving the Schengen Area.

Setting out the parameters

Shortly before the meeting began, Hohm also spoke to dpa about the outlook on life of young people in Germany who are used to no longer having to show a passport at borders or convert currencies.

The stated aim of the congress was also to set out the parameters within the AfD's ongoing programme-drafting process. Next year, after more than 10 years, the AfD intends to adopt a new manifesto, he said.

The AfD was founded in 2013 as a Eurosceptic party. In its manifesto for the 2025 election to the Bundestag, the lower house of the German parliament, the party had reaffirmed that "Germany must leave the euro system."