Right-wing extremists do well in regional relections in eastern Germany

Germany witnessed a surge of two far-right parties in regional elections on Sunday. The electorate in the two eastern statesof Brandenburg and Saxony gave the two large mainstream parties SPD and CDU a battering and voted for the neo-Nazi National Democratic Party (NPD) over 9 per cent of the vote in Saxony and the German People's Union (DVU) 6.1 per cent in Brandenburg. Both parties scored especially well with younger and with unemployed voters. Last year, the Federal Government of Germany had failed on procedural grounds in an attempt to have the NPD banned by the German Constitutional Court. Observers say the results for the right-wing extremists, combined with a very good showing of the post-Communist PDS, was a sign for the disenchantment of many citizens in eastern Germany with their economic prospects and the democratic system.