GERMANY - Beleaguered Angela Merkel is facing calls for a referendum to free German people of "EU slavery" in the wake of Britain's sensational decision to cut ties with Brussels. Far right figures in Alternative for Germany have promised to call their own vote if they clutch power in the country's general election in autumn next year.
A party spokesman branded Brussels a "bureaucracy monster", before adding: "Next year the AfD will enter the German parliament and Dexit will be top on our agenda". They called the vote a Dexit as it stands for a Deutschland exit from the EU. Eurosceptism has swept across the continent after the people of Britain backed Brexit in the historic EU referendum on June 23.
AfD chairman Bjorn Hocke said: "I know the German people want to be free of EU slavery." George Pazderski of Berlin AfD added: "Germans must decide on staying in the EU. The AfD is the only party which speaks out clearly in favour of them deciding."
Party leader Frauke Petry, who caused controversy earlier this year when she called on German police to open fire on illegal immigrants, reacted with delight at Britain's decision to sever ties with Brussels. She said: "This is the chance for a new Europe, one which maintains partnerships and respected national sovereignties."
"The Great Britain decision to leave the EU is a signal to the Brussels Politburo and its bureaucratic attachments. If the EU does not finally leave its wrong path, and the quasi-socialist experiment of deeper political integration, more European Nations will reclaim their sovereignty the way the British are."