The German far-right NPD party has taken the highly unusual step of praising refugees for their humanity, after a group of Syrian asylum-seekers administered first aid to one of its candidates involved in a car crash.
Stefan Jagsch, an NPD lead candidate at this month’s local elections in the Hesse region, lost control of his vehicle on the road between Altenstadt and Büdingen on 16 March and crashed into a tree.
According to the local fire brigade, two Syrians pulled the seriously injured Jagsch from the wreckage and administered first aid treatment before an ambulance arrived at the scene.
Jean Christoph Fiedler, the NPD’s leader in the Hesse region, told the Frankfurter Rundschau newspaper that the Syrians had “likely performed a very good, humane deed”.
The extremist party has struggled for survival in the wake of the rise of rightwing newcomers Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) and is currently appealing against a ban against it at Germany’s constitutional court.
Yet in local elections in early March, the NPD managed to gain 10.2% of the vote in the municipality where the crash took place, not least by stoking populist resentments against asylum-seekers. In January, Jagsch had taken part in a neo-Nazi march at which demonstrators were abused as “invaders”, “benefit-scrounging tourists” and “lawless primates”.
A spokesman for the Büdingen fire brigade said two vans carrying about 16 refugees had already stopped at the site of the crash by the time emergency services arrived.
Two Syrians informed the firefighters that Jagsch had still been wearing his seatbelt when they came upon the wreckage, and that he had been fully conscious during his rescue.
According to Fiedler, Jagsch was still in a local hospital as of 22 March and “doing well, considering the circumstances”.
