Extreme network around Peter Kurth
Ex-CDU politician pulls strings with ultra-right fraternity
January 19, 2024, 7:35 a.m
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Just last week, a meeting between Berlin’s former finance senator Peter Kurth and right-wing extremists came to light. Now further research shows: The former CDU member’s connections to the right-wing extremist milieu are probably closer than previously known.
Berlin’s former CDU finance senator Peter Kurth apparently has closer connections to the right-wing radical milieu than previously known. According to “Spiegel” research, Kurth has been one of the leading figures in the ultra-right Berlin fraternity Gothia for years, a powerful student association with extensive contacts in the extreme right-wing scene.
Since 2014, the long-time Christian Democrat has been a member of the board of the “Vereinigung Alter Gothen eV”, which, among other things, manages the fraternity’s assets. In 2023, Kurth took over the chairmanship of the association. According to the report, officials from the AfD, its youth organization Junge Alternative and the right-wing extremist “Identitarian Movement” met several times on the Gothia site in Berlin-Zehlendorf. Gothia had invited people to a “fraternity evening” with the former neo-Nazi Benedikt Kaiser on Wednesday, but canceled the event at short notice.
Internal documents and emails available to “Spiegel” show that several Gothia members are active in the AfD or its youth association – including Martin Kohler, head of the right-wing extremist Junge Alternative in Berlin and leader of the AfD parliamentary group in the Charlottenburg district council – Wilmersdorf. Both the Berlin fraternity Gothia and Peter Kurth left written questions from the magazine unanswered.
Meeting with AfD politicians in a private apartment
Just last week, the magazine reported on a meeting in Kurth’s private apartment to which numerous AfD politicians and right-wing extremists were invited. According to this, right-wing extremist Martin Sellner and the right-wing extremist publisher Götz Kubitschek are said to have been among the guests. The later AfD leading candidate for the European elections, Maximilian Krah, presented his new book “Politics from the Right” at the event, Kurth admitted to “Spiegel”. He also said that he was “personally friends with several members of the AfD”.
Kurth was Finance Senator in Berlin under Governing Mayor Eberhard Diepgen between 1999 and 2001. In 2009 he ran for the CDU for the office of mayor of Cologne. He is now President of the Federal Association of German Waste Management, Water and Raw Materials Industries.