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‘It breaks my heart’: far-right’s big election victory sparks dismay in German state capital

Maryam and her best friend were ambling through Magdeburg toward the railway station, talking over the dramatic events of the previous evening and the surge by the far-right Alternative für Deutschland to a historically high vote in the Saxony-Anhalt elections. “Don’t laugh at me,” she said, “but I wish we could go back to the days of Angela Merkel, when things were OK in Germany”. The teenagers, from nearby Wolmirstedt, said they were shocked by the AfD’s landslide win. But they felt powerless to do much about it and felt afraid about where it might take their home state. “We talk about it all the time,” said Maryam, whose name has been changed. “It’s on my mind constantly. My dad came to Germany from Syria in 2015. My mum and I joined him two years later.” The first clause of the anti-immigrant AfD’s 100-day programme says that – “from the first moment” of being in power – the party will deport people it deems “irregular migrants”. Maryam believes her family could well face deportation. “We have to renew our residency permits every three years as it is. We’ve always lived in a state of uncertainty. Now after these election results we face going back to Syria which we don’t think is safe, and I can’t even read or write Arabic.” The AfD won almost 44% of the vote in Sunday’s election, more than even it had hoped for. Doreen, 54, did not immediately admit to having supported the party, but said later in an interview she had put her faith in what she termed “the blues” “out of a sense of desperation”. When challenged about the human impact the party’s policies could have, for example on immigrant families, she shrugged: “It is what it is.” “If they [refugees] hadn’t turned up here in such large numbers in the first place, they wouldn’t have to go through such heart-breaking situations now,” she said. Doreen, a cleaner, said she hoped the pro-Russia AfD would be able to take power and act on promises to end refugee status for Ukrainians (as well as aid to Kyiv). “The winners will hopefully straighten up a few things right away,” she said. “They [Ukrainians] come here in their fancy cars, pretending they’re escaping devastation, but most of them have far more resources and designer clothes than I do.” Doreen is speaking close to a stolperstein, or stumbling stone – a brass plaque embedded in the concrete – commemorating Ernst Fliess, a Jewish lawyer. Born in 1877, he lived on the spot where a glass-fronted fitness club now stands until he was “humiliated, disenfranchised … (and) took flight in death” (a euphemism for suicide). But she angrily rejected any parallel between the AfD’s rise in popularity and the Weimar era rise of the Nazis. “Don’t tar me with that brush,” she said. “We are in a different age, with different problems.” Returning from their daily stroll to the Elbe river, 88-year-olds Ernst and Judith, a retired boiler maker and a design engineer who have been married for 64 years, said they did not want to talk about the election result. But it soon became clear that they were shattered by the news. Voting data has shown a stark drop-off in support for the far-right party among the over-70s. “It’s not like we didn’t see it coming,” said Judith. “But we don’t quite know what to do with the information. The reality of it hasn’t quite kicked in.” The couple said they had voted for the far-left Die Linke. Judith said she was “devastated that a party that has so little regard for refugees” had won, and by such a large margin. Her own life story – she was forced to flee her home in Silesia in 1945 and spent years in temporary accommodation before settling in Magdeburg – has greatly sensitised her to the plight of refugees, she said. “I see the look in their eyes, it doesn’t matter where they come from, who they are, and I am so empathetic to their situation,” she said. “It breaks my heart to think that almost half of the population has voted for a party that is so anti-immigrant, particularly after all Germany has gone through as a nation in the last century.” Sitting on a heart-shaped rainbow-coloured bench in front of Magdeburg’s gothic cathedral, Christiane and Franz Josef Jäker, 67 and 71, on holiday from North Rhine-Westphalia, were also digesting the news. “The populists are ruining everything,” said Franz Josef. “Everything that Germany has built up again after world war two. They promise a lot that they can’t deliver, and they also suppress a lot – such as what is going on in Ukraine – so that they can argue for the resumption of Russian gas imports to Germany.” Eric, a paramedic cheerily drumming up funds for a hospice, said he was kicking himself for not having voted. The 21-year-old son of a German mother and a Guinean father who spent 10 years applying for a German passport, said: “I try not to think about what the installation of the AfD in government might mean for me as a dark-skinned man.” Most of all he is worried about “the constitutional changes they might make, and the domino effect that might have across Germany”. Luisa, a bank teller who says she voted for Die Linke, fears for the image of her state. “It’s really bad for the reputation of Saxony-Anhalt. A lot of people have said that foreigners here will now choose to leave, but I know enough low-paid foreign workers who won’t be able to afford to do so, and will just have to put up with being badly treated. “I saw some interviews with Holocaust survivors and they drew parallels with the mood around what’s happening now and the rise of the Nazis. We have to pay attention to this similar sense they say they have – they’re not making it up.”

Tuesday briefing: What happens next after Germany’s far-right breakthrough?

Good morning. Across Germany – and Europe more widely – there has been a palpable sense of shock and disbelief after the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) swept to a historic state election victory in the early hours of Monday. It was, according to France’s European affairs minister, Benjamin Haddad, “a very grave moment for Europe”. The resonance was stark in the UK too: as the results came in, hundreds of black-clad activists intent on blocking migrant arrivals were battling with police for a second night along England’s south coast. While seasoned observers stress the context that Saxony-Anhalt, a small state in the former communist east of the country, has traditionally voted further to the right, a red line has been crossed. A far-right party has been propelled to the brink of power at regional level in Germany for the first time since the Nazis – despite 13 years of increasingly desperate efforts by mainstream parties to shut them out of government. For today’s newsletter, I spoke to the Guardian’s Berlin correspondent Kate Connolly from the state capital Magdeburg, and our Europe correspondent, Jon Henley, about why Germany’s famous firewall against the far right has failed, and what happens next. First, this morning’s headlines. Five big stories UK news | Batons and synthetic pepper spray were used to repel hundreds of masked, black-clad vigilantes in Portsmouth on Sunday, it has emerged, as the policing minister said officers had been injured as they repelled organised “aggression”. Israel | Ed Miliband will announce what he has described as a broad reset of the UK’s relations with Israel on Tuesday, promising the government will take a more active approach in supporting the Palestinian cause. US | The Trump administration has raised “serious concerns” over Downing Street’s plan to force digital platforms to hand more prominence to established broadcasters, warning the move risks “facilitating censorship”. Climate crisis | Nepal is demanding $20m in climate compensation for the recent devastating floods, as a senior minister called on the world’s most polluting countries to “wake up” and accept shared responsibility. UK politics | There is little appetite for cuts to disability benefits even among Conservative and Reform voters, and proposals to reduce spending could prove politically risky, according to an authoritative national survey. In depth: ‘A palpable sense of disbelief’ The first person Kate spoke to when she arrived in Magdeburg on Monday afternoon was a paramedic named Eric, who was fundraising for a local hospice. He explained how his father had spent years working to obtain a German passport after migrating from Guinea. “Already that day he felt the mood on the street had become more hostile,” Kate told me. I know from experience how difficult it can be to persuade strangers to elaborate on their private voting decisions – especially when you have copy to file in a hurry – but yesterday was different, she said: “Everybody had very profound thoughts to share.” She described conversations with a “heartbroken” older couple, who had grown up under communism; a 16-year-old who arrived from Syria under Angela Merkel’s open borders policy in 2015 and was frightened she would be first on the list to send back; another woman who’d voted for the AfD and said she didn’t appreciate being “tarred with the same brush” as supporters of Hitler in the 1930s. Kate interviewed her as they stood by a Stolperstein, a memorial plaque to a victim of Nazi persecution. As we spoke, thousands were gathering at Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate to express their opposition to the AfD, and where there was a palpable sense of disbelief and dread as news of the results filtered. *** Why is the AfD on the rise? The German chancellor, Friedrich Merz, was elected leader of the centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) in 2022 on a pledge to halve the AfD’s vote. Instead it has doubled, and support for his centrist coalition that has tumbled. A “deeply shocked” Merz vowed to stay in office yesterday after the nativist party triumphed with 44% of the vote, just short of an absolute majority The turnout in Saxony-Anhalt was breathtaking. At 77.8%, compared with 60.3% in 2021, it suggests the AfD – classified as extremist by Germany’s security services – has succeeded in energising many who didn’t vote at all five years ago. Detailed polling analysis suggests that, while one in three AfD supporters align with the party’s extremist ideology, its growing popularity is driven by a diversity of voters who feel alienated from mainstream politics. Ulrich Siegmund, the AfD’s lead candidate in Saxony-Anhalt, is a charismatic former perfume salesman who has weaponised voter discontent around the faltering economy and migration – even though irregular immigration has reduced since Merz came into office. Research from 2023 found a direct link between rent increases – particularly amonglower income voters – and likelihood of supporting the AfD. Last month, Der Spiegel put Siegmund on its front cover, with the tagline “Germany’s most dangerous man”. He responded by filming himself signing copies for his 800,000 TikTok followers. Siegmund has capitalised on a mood of ostalgie – nostalgia for communist East Germany – and bubbling resentment among poorer east Germans who view themselves as second-class citizens compared to people from the west. Strikingly, it appears one of the highest shares of the AfD’s vote came from the 35- to 44 age group, who were children or infants when the Berlin Wall came down. *** What does the result mean for Germany? There’s now debate about whether the previous consensus over how mainstream parties should deal with the far right – the so-called “Brandmauer”, or firewall – has horribly backfired. Sceptics believe this non-cooperation with AfD at any level from local councils up to federal government has allowed the party to escape the scrutiny that comes with holding office. Another criticism is that it has neutered the political mainstream. “The argument runs that in order to keep the far right out, it forces mainstream parties into unnatural coalitions,” Jon says. The compromises that they have to strike have resulted in ineffective government and in turn feeds the extremes further.” Now, there are complex coalition talks ahead for the parties in Saxony-Anhalt. While Siegmund has rejected leading a minority administration, initial indications are that the AfD could govern with the hard-left, pro-Russian Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht party, which received 5.3% of the vote. If he succeeds in becoming the state’s first far-right governor, Siegmund will have control over significant policy areas including education, policing and public broadcasting. AfD has already proposed revisions to the school curriculum, in what one party member described as “more Bismarck, less Hitler”, as well as defunding anti-racism initiatives and removing pride flags. Jon also suggests the AfD might make changes to civil service recruitment “to create a more supportive environment”. But securing the Saxony-Anhalt government would also give the AfD seats in the Bundesrat upper house: while they wouldn’t have enough seats to block legislation they could still act as a disruptive force. And with the AfD leading the polls nationally, there’s a likely ripple effect across the country. There are more state elections later this month – including in traditionally liberal Berlin, where the AfD is now polling at 18%, with the CDU maintaining a slim lead in the early 20s. If their vote share rises across states, options for coalition building without the AfD become increasingly convoluted, further flattening the mainstream’s ability to govern confidently. *** … And for Europe? Not all of Europe’s far-right leaders have welcomed this development. Jon, who is based in Paris, has been listening to France’s National Rally – which under Marine Le Pen has spent years successfully detoxifying its image – on the airwaves insisting that, in his words, “these guys are way too extreme for us”. To give you one example, two years ago the National Rally expelled the AfD from its European parliamentary group, which includes Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni, following revelations that the party backed mass deportations and downplayed the crimes of the Nazi SS. But any domestic shock waves in Europe’s largest economy will inevitably affect the bloc. “A weakened German government in complete upheaval would obviously be bad news for Europe,” says Jon. “It could affect things like the bloc’s policy towards migration; the environment, because the AfD is famously climate-sceptic; and Ukraine, because it’s also pretty much pro-Kremlin.” In a press conference yesterday, an ashen-faced Merz drew a fairly explicit link between the AfD and Russia, noting that “2,500 km in the east, the election results were being celebrated.” This may reflect growing calls within the CDU and their coalition partner, the Social Democrats, for Merz to toughen his stance on Russia. After a drone attack on Leipzig airport in August, the German government took a month before publicly blaming Moscow, though the language could not have been more direct when foreign minister Johann Wadephul stated: “We are not at war, but we are a daily target of hybrid warfare.” With a series of federal or presidential elections taking place in Spain, France, Italy, Poland, and Germany over the next two years, the AfD’s landslide can be viewed as an indication of coming peril and a challenge on how to meet it. “The far right’s ideas have been steadily normalised by the media and the political centre,” says Jon. “They have completely framed the immigration debate, and everybody else is just scrambling to react to them”. As Keir Starmer’s government discovered with Reform in the UK, repurposing populist rhetoric doesn’t convince disaffected voters. “Political scientists across Europe would say this result is down to that, and the failure by mainstream parties to come up with inspiring policies that will actually make a real difference to people’s lives and address some of the reasons why they choose to vote for the far right,” he said. • For more on the far right in Europe, sign up to This Is Europe, our free weekly with selection of the most pressing stories and debates. What else we’ve been enjoying I thought David Smith’s re-telling of 9/11, through the eyes of two strangers who met in the middle of the smoke and became some of the only people who survived the incident, was brilliant. Poppy Noor, newsletters team Nesrine Malik is the best voice in Britain writing about Israel and Gaza. Her column on the horrific plans of Israeli ministers is well worth your time. Hettie One of the most interesting things about working at the Guardian is the letters we get from our readers. This recent series of responses about how to solve the prisons crisis made many good suggestions. Hettie I enjoyed Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor’s recent piece in the Financial Times (£) about “end times fascism” and the Nazi warships revealed as rivers in eastern Europe dried up this summer. Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor will be speaking at a Guardian event later this month (tickets here). Hettie The Guardian Australia has just launched a new politics newsletter to bring you up to speed on the stories that really matter, and what they mean for you. Sign up here. Sport US Open | Zheng Qinwen recovered from 5-0 down in the opening set to stun Iga Świątek and reach the last eight of the US Open, while Elena Rybakina beat Naomi Osaka 6-1 6-4. Cricket | Pakistan have launched an investigation into the “discipline and conduct” during their tour of England, with two players understood to have had their mobile phones confiscated as part of the probe. F1 | Bernie Ecclestone was detained in Portugal on Monday after customs authorities found him in possession of an undocumented shotgun. The front pages “UK hardens stance on Israel with ban on illegal settlements trade”, is the Guardian’s front page today, while the Times has “PM to declare trade ban on settlements in West Bank”. The FT leads on “Pressure builds on Germany’s Merz as far-right AfD toasts ‘dream result’”, the i Paper says “New ISA to help Britain’s older first-time buyers”. On small boats protests Metro has “Port in a storm”, the Mirror says “Now they try to stop the lifeboats”, while the Express’s take is “Don’t ignore public anger over illegal migrants”. The Telegraph splash with “King tells Harry: No return to the firm”, Mail writes “King puts Harry and Meghan in their place”, and the Sun writes “Megxit means Megxit”. Today in Focus: The Latest Far-right protesters descend on Dover and Portsmouth The government has condemned the ‘thuggish and intimating behaviour’ of far-right activists clad in black and balaclavas who caused disruption and unrest in Dover and Portsmouth over the weekend in an attempt to obstruct asylum seekers arriving on small boats. The action was seemingly organised by Daniel Thomas, an agitator better known as Danny Tommo, who has close ties with the far-right extremist Tommy Robinson. Thomas was recorded on the ground saying Portsmouth was now ‘ground zero’ for small boat crossings, and has threatened further action. Lucy Hough speaks to political correspondent Ben Quinn. Cartoon of the day | Ben Jennings The Upside A bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all bad For the first time in a century, glow-worms are shining again in North Yorkshire. In recent decades, the bioluminescent female invertebrates had vanished from the British countryside. But after a budget reintroduction programme led by volunteer “glow-getters”, they’ve been spotted over multiple weeks this summer at Nosterfield nature reserve near Ripon. Sign up here for a weekly roundup of The Upside, sent to you every Sunday Bored at work? And finally, the Guardian’s puzzles are here to keep you entertained throughout the day. Until tomorrow. Quick crossword Cryptic crossword Wordiply

Canada’s retaliatory US tariffs take effect as trade dispute grows

Canada’s retaliatory tariffs on billions of dollars’ worth of American imports have come into effect, escalating a trade fight that has been marked by intensifying tensions between US president Donald Trump and Canadian prime minister Mark Carney. The tariffs took effect at 12.01am on Tuesday, and range from 15% to 50% and apply to products covering $20bn in imports from the US. The measures target sectors including steel, dairy, appliances, agricultural equipment, pulp and paper, and electronics – industries that have been most affected by US tariffs. The retaliatory tariffs come “as a result of the United States’ decision to impose a 50% tariff on $20bn of Canadian goods effective August 22”, the Canadian government said. “Canada’s counter-measures do not apply to US goods that are in transit to Canada on the day on which they come into force,” it added. Last month, Trump announced a new 50% tariff on cars and raw materials from Canada. He accused the country of “ripping off” the US “for years”. The US tariffs hit items such as hockey sticks and cement, affecting about 5.5% of Canadian exports to the US. Since then, tensions between Canada and the US have intensified, with Carney last week urging the Trump administration to “start being serious” as the trade dispute has increasingly spilled into broader diplomatic tensions. Trump and senior US officials have repeatedly criticized Canada and its leadership, while Trump has taken a series of symbolic digs at Canada including signing an executive order renaming Lake Ontario “Lake America” – which Canadians have rejected. On Monday, Trump threatened to block sales of Canada’s Bombardier Aviation in the US, unless the Quebec-based plane maker moves manufacturing to the US. “No more selling Bombardier in the United States!” Trump posted in all caps on his Truth Social platform, though he did not specify how he would achieve a sales halt. Thousands of Bombardier aircraft currently operate in US airlines’ domestic fleets. In a statement on Monday, the aerospace company touted its creation of “tens of thousands of jobs across the United States”, with “direct employment” in more than 20 states including Kansas, Texas, Arizona and California. The company also noted that it spent more than $2.5bn annually with suppliers, and said its supply chain was “made up of approximately 2,800 American companies across 47 states”. Negotiations between both sides broke down on 21 August after days of meetings in Washington, with Carney saying at the time that the Trump administration’s terms were ultimately unacceptable and that US negotiators had introduced restrictions on Canadian trade deals with other countries at the 11th hour. US officials also made unacceptable “threats” to the French language and “Quebec culture”, he added, referencing the French-speaking province in eastern Canada, with Carney saying American negotiators viewed the measures as an “irritant”, while “in Quebec, these are rights”. But Trump’s top trade official Jamieson Greer later noted the US government was aware that French language protections were sensitive and important. “This is not something where we push hard, or condition, or red-line,” he told Canadian public broadcaster CBC last month. Polls show Carney has broad support from Canadians, but it could disappear within months as the consequences of the trade war sink in, according to political analysts. Just 20% of Americans approved of Trump’s ⁠tariffs on Canadian goods, a Reuters/Ipsos poll found. Carney said last week his government was ready to sign a trade deal that benefited both countries, but US media reports say there are currently no ongoing negotiations between the two sides. With Agence France-Presse and Reuters

Hijacking pirates exploit regional chaos to return to seas off Somalia

The scourge of Somali piracy targeting cargo ships and smaller dhows off the Horn of Africa has returned to levels not seen in a decade, driven by a convergence of factors including disruptions to the shipping industry caused by the US-Israeli war against Iran and a resurgence of political instability in Somalia. Since late April there have been eight hijackings by Somali pirates, including two within the space of a fortnight in August: one targeting an oil tanker with ties to Iran, the other a Cameroon-flagged vessel, the Lutuf, carrying military equipment for Turkey. Over a seven-year period from 2005 there were more than 1,000 attacks on vessels in the waters off Somalia, which has Africa’s longest coastline. Thousands of crew members were taken hostage, netting $400m (£296m) in ransom payments for the piracy network’s financiers, the low-level “foot-soldier” pirates and the communities who provided them with goods and services. The attacks only petered out after a multinational anti-piracy force was deployed. The hijacking of the Lutuf was the most high-profile of the recent incidents. Turkey has been expanding its influence in Somalia after an agreement signed in 2024 to build up its navy, and the Lutuf’s release two weeks after its capture involved a joint Turkish-Somali operation that resulted in the destruction of four pirate vessels. However, local officials including Mohamed Mubarak, the head of the Puntland security coordination office, have said that a $2.5m (£1.85m) ransom was also paid, prompting warnings that such payments risked encouraging similar incidents. In a comment for the Center for Maritime Security in July, Matthew Reisener, the thinktank’s national security adviser, warned that naval campaigns by Iran in the strait of Hormuz and Iran’s Houthi proxies in the Red Sea – launched in response to the US-Israel war on Iran – are allowing regional piracy “to once again thrive”. He wrote: “Not only have the global navies that once combatted piracy off the Horn of Africa diverted their resources to counter the threats against ships in these critical waterways, but these conflicts have also drawn maritime traffic closer to Somalia’s coastline, creating openings for opportunistic pirates to target commercial ships.” According to Reisener, about 70% of maritime traffic that passed through the Red Sea prior to the Houthis’ targeting of ships there is now being rerouted around the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa. A report by the International Institute for Strategic Studies in May reached a similar conclusion: “The recent deterioration of maritime security followed a prolonged period of relative calm in the waters off the Somali coast, which resulted in the redeployment of international anti-piracy fleets and the relaxation of commercial risk-management practices. These factors – alongside the distraction posed by Houthi attacks in the Red Sea – have converged to create an opening that Somali pirates have been quick to exploit.” Analysts also note that rising oil prices driven by the war have made oil cargoes a more valuable target. *** Among the least developed countries in the world, Somalia has endured conflict and clan battles with no strong central government since the autocratic ruler Mohamed Siad Barre fell in 1991. Insufficient patrol vessels and an inability to regularly pay salaries to those involved in coastal patrols are among the reasons why Somalia has long-struggled to secure its coastline. Piracy has historically thrived during periods of increasing instability and political, factional and regional competition. Observers say the recent rise in incidents has been exacerbated by a domestic and international focus on arms smuggling to Yemen by networks acting on behalf of Iran. Analysts suggest some of these networks have become increasingly associated with Somalia’s Islamist al-Shabaab group as it once again expands its territorial control in central and southern Somalia and seeks to build ties with the Houthis in Yemen. Local officials interviewed by the Guardian described how in the recent spate of incidents, pirate groups have been using vessels they had already seized to attack and capture other vessels. According to the officials, the Lutuf was approached as it sailed three nautical miles from Somali shores near the fishing town of Maraya by a previously hijacked cement carrier, the MV Sward, which had been repurposed as a pirate mothership. Eight gunmen from the Sward then boarded the Lutuf and were able to overpower the ship’s armed guards. Officials say the recent attacks have also been marked by increased technological sophistication on the part of pirate groups, including the use of SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet service to facilitate the tracking of potential targets and for high-speed communications between pirates. That reflects what Lloyd’s List has described as an increasingly “more capable and adaptive Somali piracy threat” that is already exposing vulnerabilities in carriers’ existing anti-piracy security measures. In the weeks since the Lutuf ransom was paid, residents of Galkayo, a commercial hub in the north-central Mudug region, said money had started circulating through the local economy to a much greater degree than before. Consumption of the stimulant khat has reportedly increased, and greater numbers of expensive sports utility vehicles have been seen on the roads. During the previous piracy boom, increased flows of money through the economies of coastal communities and places like Galkayo had profound societal impacts, including an expansion of alcohol and drug use and prostitution. Perhaps foreshadowing the regime of tougher measures that may be required to counter the growing piracy threat, the Lutuf was only released after a series of drone attacks on the pirate groups involved in the seizure, both at sea and on land. The dead included nine armed men who were killed by a missile fired from a Turkish drone as they prepared boats to join the gunmen onboard the Lutuf. The question now is whether the growing threat can be countered. Writing in The Conversation in May, the UK-based academics Anja Shortland and Federico Varese, who studied Somalia’s piracy problem in 2014, were uncertain whether there was an international appetite or the capacity for the same sort of anti-piracy force deployed more than a decade ago. “What happens next will depend on how the current hijacks proceed. Pirates rely on ransoms for reinvestment and to attract young men into their no-win-no-fee contracts. Fast and generous payments … may free the captive ships. But they will lead to escalating risks for everyone else. “No state or alliance also currently has the will or capacity to run a naval mission on the scale seen in 2011 and 2012, when navies worldwide spent more than US$1bn annually on counter-piracy operations off Somalia. “Although piracy manifests as a sea-based problem, it can only be solved on land.”

Majority of Tory and Reform voters do not back cuts to disability benefits, survey finds

There is little appetite for cuts to disability benefits even among Conservative and Reform voters, and proposals to reduce spending could prove politically risky, according to an authoritative national survey. The British Social Attitudes (BSA) report found that while support for welfare spending as a whole had dipped sharply in recent years, just 7% of respondents backed cuts to disability benefits – and 49% said they should be increased. Two government-commissioned reviews – of the personal independence payment (Pip) benefit, and support for jobless youngsters – are expected imminently, amid speculation they will seek to restrict spending on disability benefits. The BSA report notes that any ministerial proposals to axe disability benefits would carry little support among Labour voters, of whom just 5% favoured reduced spending and 57% backed more generous spending. Support for spending on disabled people remained high among Tory and Reform UK voters of whom 40% supported more spending on claimants who could not work, and just 10% supported less spending. The report’s co-author Robert de Vries, a senior lecturer at the University of Kent, said: “Despite growing political divisions on welfare, support for disability benefits remains remarkably strong. “Very few people favour cuts, disabled people are seen as among the most deserving recipients of support, and proposals to reduce disability benefits appear politically risky across the political spectrum.” However, the report acknowledges it was difficult to be precise about public support for disability benefits, some of which depends on respondents’ subjective ideas of whether claimants were “deserving” or “genuinely” unable to work. It was possible that there was support for cuts to specific groups of disabled people, with some conditions such as depression and anxiety ranking relatively low in an informal public hierarchy of “deserving cases” compared with, say, people who use a wheelchair. Equally, the report added that initial public support for proposed cuts can change when it becomes clearer precisely who will be affected, and what the consequences are in terms of numbers of claimants pushed into hardship. “We … cannot say in advance whether a particular cut to disability benefits will be supported or opposed by the public, but it is clear that this is very challenging terrain for a government to be confident of taking the public with them,” the report said. The survey interviewed 4,656 people across the UK between August and October 2025. It has tracked British public attitudes since 1983 on a range of issues from immigration and taxation, to marriage and sexuality. Last year the government was forced to U-turn on £5bn of disability benefit cuts in the face of public opposition and a Labour backbench rebellion over plans that would have pushed hundreds of thousands of disabled people into poverty. It subsequently launched a review of Pip headed by the former welfare minister Sir Stephen Timms. Its initial findings, published in July, found that Pip, which is claimed by nearly 4 million people in England and Wales, should be overhauled. However, it said changes would have to be financially sustainable. A separate review by the former Labour MP Alan Milburn into how to support nearly 1 million young people aged 16-24 who are not in education, employment or training (Neets) has led to concerns that benefit support for youngsters claiming Pip or the health element of universal credit may be cut. Both the Conservatives, who launched a review to save £23bn, and Reform UK, which claims drastic cuts to Pip could help save up to £50bn, are keen to bring down what they characterise as out of control disability benefits spending. The BSA report notes that while disability benefit spending has risen in recent years, overall levels of welfare spending have remained flat, suggesting that media and political claims of an unsustainable system are overstated.

Friedrich Merz is now on borrowed time. But that’s not why the AfD’s triumph is seismic | Jörg Lau

As shock at the scale of the far right’s resounding state-election victory in Germany reverberated on Sunday, not everybody was unhappy. Seconds after the first exit polls from Saxony-Anhalt were revealed, Donald Trump posted the results on his Truth Social platform, seemingly delighted by the devastation of the centrist-conservative Christian Democrats (CDU) and the surge of the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD). It was indeed a humiliation for the CDU chancellor, Friedrich Merz, whose party lost more than half of its seats in the state parliament, while the AfD increased its count from 23 to 39. This was the exact opposite of what Merz promised to deliver when campaigning for office. With good government under his guidance, he insisted, he would easily cut the AfD in half. The AfD’s co-leaders did not miss the opportunity to point out the historic upset in their victory speeches, with Alice Weidel even boasting the CDU would “never win an election again”. Leaving the AfD’s swagger aside, this is a political earthquake with consequences far beyond a little state in the centre of Germany. The shock waves are still coming. To begin with, it is unclear if (and for how long) Merz can hold his own coalition together and cling to the chancellorship. True, the losses in the state of Saxony-Anhalt are not directly his fault. But that is only because he is so unpopular that his own party did not want him to campaign. Merz’s face was not on any posters, and when he visited the state capital, Magdeburg, the public was carefully excluded. That says it all about his standing in his own party. Two more elections are coming up on 20 September, in Berlin and the Baltic coastal state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. On the current trajectory, the CDU is looking at two more debacles. Merz’s leadership has become a liability, and it will be contested sooner rather than later. For now, only the absence of a convincing alternative and the many constitutional hurdles against sudden leadership changes in Germany protect him. He is the public face of a crisis of confidence in Germany’s leadership, but he is not its sole cause. The seismic nature of this moment goes far beyond party tactics. Germany is entering a period of political upheaval in which the core values of the postwar republic are up for dispute. Most shockingly, this extends to the anti-fascist consensus of “never again”, established over decades in many heated debates on the Holocaust and the crimes of the Wehrmacht. The AfD has managed to attack the national consensus that facing up to the Nazi past is fundamental for democracy in Germany. The party’s message is the opposite: the culture of remembrance is an “identity disorder” holding Germany back. It’s a central tenet of the AfD’s platform that it can “heal” the country by relativising its guilt and focusing on German greatness instead. This is why Charlotte Knobloch, a 93-year-old Holocaust survivor and former chair of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, expressed “horror” about the results. Knobloch said she “struggled, on days like these, to recognise my homeland”, adding: “In my worst nightmares, I could not have imagined that rightwing extremists win elections again in this manner.” She is right to be alarmed. The Saxony-Anhalt state chapter of the AfD is confirmed by domestic intelligence to be among the most radical nationally. Hardcore former neo-Nazis sit in influential positions. A distinctive trait of Germany’s far right compared with France or Italy is often overlooked. The AfD is markedly different from other rightwing populist parties in Europe: it is becoming ever-more radical the closer it gets to power. The leadership in Magdeburg employs several former members of prohibited neo-Nazi groups. These people might soon serve in high offices in the state, controlling the police, the domestic spy service (Verfassungsschutz), the judiciary and education. It’s a sign of the deterioration of political norms in my country that this shocking outlook hardly figured in the aftermath of the election. The German taboo about hard-right extremists in executive office is crumbling. The AfD slogans against the mainstream parties (“Altparteien”) have a distinctly Weimar vibe, echoing hateful propaganda against the despised “system” from a century ago. It is no coincidence that books on the end of the Weimar republic are bestsellers these days. The AfD is not a normal party. It must be understood as a (counter)revolutionary movement trying to change the system from within. Its leaders’ ambitions go beyond this or that policy change. Look at the crucial topic of migration: the number of asylum applications is rapidly falling (down by 48% in July 2026 compared with the same month last year), partly due to restrictive measures by Merz’s government. Still, the hard right is growing and radicalising at the same time. At the core is the idea of a German ethnostate with as few foreigners as possible. The party’s rallying cry of “remigration” targets not just “illegals” but all immigrants (and their descendants) with unwanted foreign backgrounds. The leadership have coined a term for what they do not want to become: they vow to avoid “Melonisierung” (Meloni-isation). Giorgia Meloni, despite her neo-fascist roots, surprised many at home and abroad by moving towards the mainstream, by standing with Ukraine and supporting the eurozone, Nato and the principle of free movement within the EU. The AfD, by contrast, promises to leave the EU and eurozone and put an end to the Schengen agreement. It is fiercely pro-Russian and wants to cut any support for Ukraine (including sending refugees back). Fear of escalation with Russia played a big part in the election. The recent hybrid attacks on Leipzig airport and other infrastructure may have tipped the scales: Merz had pointed a finger at Russia and vowed to “make the perpetrators pay”. This turned out to be perfect fodder for the AfD’s campaign. Abandoning Ukraine, rapprochement with Russia, reopening the Nord Stream pipeline in the Baltic – all this was presented as a “policy of peace”. This is also an election win for Vladimir Putin. What’s next? Without an absolute majority, the AFD may depend on the cooperation of a tiny splinter party. The leadership of the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW), which broke away from the hard-left Die Linke, may want to help. They represent a new brand of leftist nationalism which is fiercely anti-immigrant and pro-Russian – and in that sense compatible with the AfD. Still, forming a government in Magdeburg will not be plain sailing. And it is a long way from this point for the AfD to take Berlin. One glimmer of light is that civil society is mobilising, now the initial shock has worn off. We can expect big demonstrations in major cities. A silent anti-fascist majority is beginning to organise. But it will be hard to break the dark spell that this victory in a troubled state has cast over the political landscape in Germany. One thing is certain: the coming weeks will be a challenge to the political imagination, not just for Germans. Jörg Lau is an international correspondent for the German weekly Die Zeit

Ukraine war briefing: New political turmoil in Kyiv as prosecutor general resigns

Ukraine’s prosecutor general, Ruslan Kravchenko, has resigned amid corruption accusations that saw anti-graft officers search his offices at the weekend as part of investigations into illegal call centres. Kravchenko has rejected any allegations against him, calling them “completely unsubstantiated” and denying wrongdoing. The National Anti-Corruption Bureau (Nabu) and Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (Sapo) announced on Saturday that they had uncovered a money-laundering scheme “led by an official in the prosecutor general’s office” and had conducted raids there. According to investigators, a corrupt network received money to protect call centres that carried out phone scams and “laundered fortunes amounting to millions”. Nabu published images of a safe filled with bundles of dollar bills, saying it uncovered five members behind the scheme, without naming them. A deputy of Kravchenko has been remanded in custody on suspicion of money laundering in connection with the case. Volodymyr Zelenskyy in 2025 faced protests that forced him to reverse efforts to make Nabu and Sapo subordinate to the national prosecutor’s office. According to the Swiss-based Global Initiative Against Transnational Crime (GI-TOC), illegal call centres employ about 60,000 people in Ukraine. On Monday, Kravchenko posted: “I have submitted my resignation as prosecutor general. I do not want the office of prosecutor general to be used as a tool in political confrontation. My position regarding the charges remains unchanged.” The new turmoil confronting Zelenskyy, Ukraine’s president, comes after a shootout between Ukraine’s SBU and GUR security and intelligence services. Kyiv is also bedding in new military leadership after Zelenskyy sacked the defence minister and was then forced by protests to sack Ukraine’s military commander-in-chief as well because of feuding between the pair. Russia resumed its attacks on Kyiv, Ukraine’s emergency service said late on Monday, as air raid alerts were issued in more than a dozen regions. It came after the expiration of a three-day halt in attacks while US envoys visited the Ukrainian capital and Moscow. Kyiv’s city military administration said at least two people were killed and seven wounded. The strikes damaged buildings across Kyiv, including a five-storey apartment block in the Solomianskyi district, while vehicles caught fire in the Podilskyi district. “Russians attacked Boryspil and Fastiv districts with drones,” the emergency service said. Social media channels monitoring air threats on Ukraine said Moscow’s forces had started to transport ballistic missiles and relocate heavy bombers from Russia’s east to airfields closer to Ukraine. Russia “does not rule out the resumption of the trilateral format”, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Monday, referring to possible talks involving the Russians, Ukrainians and the US. “But it is too early to say anything about the venue or the exact dates at this stage,” Peskov added. US negotiators told European representatives during talks in Kyiv that Russia was showing a “new willingness” to negotiate over the Ukraine war, the French presidency said on Monday. “The Americans told us that there was a new willingness on the part of Russia to negotiate following the Duma [Russian lower house] elections, and we should prepare for a fresh start to the negotiations,” said an aide to Emmanuel Macron, the French president. Donald Trump’s administration, though, has repeatedly construed Putin’s willingness to meet US representatives and reel off his unaltered maximalist demands as a willingness to negotiate. Ukraine struck a Russian ⁠oil refinery ⁠in the Ryazan region, as ⁠well as oil-processing facilities in the ⁠Perm region ‌and Tatarstan, ‌Zelenskyy ‌said on Monday. Both attacks were confirmed by regional governors – in Perm the governor said one person was ⁠killed ⁠and four others were injured ⁠when one of the drones ‌damaged a residential building. A Russian ⁠attack damaged ⁠a British ⁠American Tobacco plant in the town ⁠of Pryluky in Ukraine’s northern ⁠Chernihiv region with no known injuries, BAT Ukraine’s ⁠press office said. Off-site power at the Zaporizhzhia ⁠nuclear ⁠plant in south-eastern Ukraine has been restored via ⁠the Ferosplavna power line, according to Rosatom, the Russian state nuclear corporation ⁠that is illegally in control of the power station. The plant had ‌been without ‌external power since 20 August and ‌reliant on emergency diesel generators for cooling of its nuclear fuel. The International Atomic Energy Agency confirmed that repairs were completed during a ceasefire that it brokered. Latvia’s ⁠government plans to impose a 300% tariff on grain arriving ⁠from Russia and ⁠Belarus. Officials in ⁠Latvia and its neighbour Lithuania last week said they considered ending ⁠shipments of Russian grain through their ports after Moscow ‌stepped up the ‌transits in response to attacks by Ukraine ‌on its Baltic ports. The UN human rights chief, Volker Türk, said he was “horrified by reports that fully autonomous drones launched by the Russian Federation killed three Ukrainians last month”. Türk called for an urgent ban on such weapons. The New York Times has reported that a Russian drone guided entirely by an artificial intelligence system killed three civilians in Zaporizhzhia on 6 July.

Nepal says big polluters must ‘wake up’ as it calls for climate compensation over flood disaster

Nepal is demanding $20m in climate compensation for the recent devastating floods, as a senior minister called on the world’s most polluting countries to “wake up” and accept shared responsibility for a disaster that led to the death or disappearance of more than 6,000 people. Scientists believe the climate crisis had a role to play in the floods, which were triggered when a melting glacier partially collapsed and set off a deadly landslide and flash flooding through Chinese-controlled Tibet and Nepal in late August. So far, more than 1,300 are confirmed dead and more than 5,500 still missing, with hopes of their survival diminished after 12 days of rescue operations. Speaking to the Guardian, Nepal’s foreign minister, Shisir Khanal, was forthright in his call for climate justice and said it was imperative the world’s biggest economies stepped up to help Nepal recover and rebuild after the catastrophic floods. Nepal contributes less than 0.1% of global greenhouse gas emissions, while its neighbours India and China are among the world’s biggest emitters. The mountains of the Himalayas – which span across India, China, Nepal and Bhutan – have been warming at a rate nearly 50% faster than the global average. In 2023, the UN said Nepal’s mountains had lost close to a third of their ice in just over 30 years due to global heating. Khanal emphasised that the recent disaster was far more extreme than any flooding regularly seen during the monsoon season, and said the magnitude of damage was on par with the 2015 earthquake that left much of the country in ruins. “This felt like a tsunami that was coming from the Himalayas,” he said. “We experienced waves as high as 60, 70 feet, which were mixed with debris, mud, stones, rocks, and came at the speed of almost 180km per hour. Towns, villages and highways were completely wiped out and there are some areas still disconnected.” Khanal confirmed that Nepal’s ministry of finance and ministry of environment had written a joint letter to the UN’s fund for responding to loss and damage – which was set up in 2022 in line with the Paris climate agreement – to request $20m in climate-related damages. “We have contributed so little to climate change,” he said. “It is imperative for those in the global community who benefit from larger, much more polluting economies, and whose historical contribution to greenhouse gases is much bigger than ours, to accept a shared responsibility. This affects all of humanity.” For Nepal, the disaster was particularly worrying because it was “one of the strongest warning signals that we’ve experienced of what’s to come”, he said. “The global community should not see this as one-off disaster; it should be viewed in the context of the changing climate in the Himalayas,” he said. “We know it is going to be a recurring scenario that more and more communities, not just in Nepal but around the world, will have to face.” Khanal acknowledged that the compensation amount Nepal has requested from the UN was “obviously not nearly enough to cover the damage that we have sustained”. According to some estimates, the total damage caused by the floods will be upwards of $5bn, though Khanal said it could be even higher. Upwards of 20,000 homes will probably have to be rebuilt, as well as the main highway. Villages built in vulnerable areas along the river, some of which washed away entirely, may have to be relocated to higher, safer ground. While Khanal initially singled out India and China as countries that should step in to help – while avoiding mention of the US, which is the world’s biggest polluter – he rowed back on those comments, saying: “It is not just about shifting the blame to one or the other country, it’s about us all working together.” He emphasised that the compensation demand was also meant to act as a “wake-up call for the global community to establish a more robust mechanism to help vulnerable and small economies like Nepal”. The UN has admitted the loss and damage fund is already facing a “significant financing gap”. The fund has already received requests totalling $2.8bn from about 119 countries, but so far only around $400m has been given by the international community. The US has given just $17m, after Donald Trump withdrew from the Paris agreement. Khanal acknowledged there were “political challenges” in getting Nepal the climate compensation it was demanding. “Yes there always will be people who may not agree to our perspective or deny there is climate change, but there are also people who deny that the Earth is round,” he said bluntly. He emphasised the importance of funds being made available not just for immediate disaster response but also for preparedness and mitigation for climate-related risk. Khanal rebuffed allegations that China had failed to give an adequate warning or share data with Nepal about the impending floods. He said he was in discussion with China about enhancing coordination and data sharing for the Himalayan region. “With the benefit of hindsight, we can now see that this glacier was fragile and had been receding in the past six months,” he said. “But before the floods hit, there was no knowledge on our part, or on the part of Chinese scientists, that this particular collapse was imminent. I do not believe any of us had any idea of the threat until it happened.”