Stora tråden om AfD

"There are people in this country who say 'we can do it,' and those who actually get something done," Jörg Meuthen, the spokesman for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), said on Saturday as he opened the AfD's first national convention as a party in the Bundestag.

The comment was a clear shot across the aisle at Chancellor Angela Merkel, who had famously said "we can do it" in response to questions about how Germany would take in hundreds of thousands of displaced people beginning in 2015. The AfD has made refugees the party's bread and butter since it morphed from its roots in euroskeptic fiscal conservatism to the anti-immigrant nationalism it is known for today.

Meuthen appeared positively gleeful that, over two months after Germany's federal elections, Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU) have yet to form a government.

"More mature, more adult, smarter" is how Meuthen described the AfD, which would be the largest opposition party in the Bundestag if Merkel's CDU forms another grand coalition with the center-left Social Democrats. That would allow AfD members to speak first in Bundestag debates.

Members of the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) party elected a right-wing nationalist to be their co-leader on Saturday, signalling a possible toughening of tone before regional votes next year.

A party congress chose Alexander Gauland - who once defended an AfD member who had said history should be rewritten to focus on German victims of World War Two - to return to the post he had held until 2015.

The Cologne police tweeted New Year's greetings and linked to information on celebrating safely in a series of messages in German and other languages, including Arabic. Cologne was the scene two years ago of mass sexual assaults on New Year's Eve in which most of the suspects were described as young men of North African and Arab origin.

"What the hell is happening in this country? Why is an official police site tweeting in Arabic? Do you think it is to appease the barbaric, gang-raping hordes of Muslim men?" wrote Beatrix von Storch, the deputy leader of the AfD's parliamentary group.

The tweet was later deleted after Twitter froze von Storch's account and informed her she had violated hate speech rules. Her account was shut down for 12 hours. The Cologne police said on Monday that they had filed a criminal complaint against von Storch for hate speech.

The far-right, anti-Islam Alternative for Germany (AfD) party on Tuesday confirmed reports in the German media that one of its politicians, Arthur Wagner, has converted to Islam.

Wagner, a leading AfD member in the eastern German state of Brandenburg, resigned his position on the party's national executive committee on January 11 for personal reasons, AfD spokesman Daniel Friese said.

"The party has no problem with that," added Friese.

He insisted the AfD's national party included groups representing the interests of Muslims, as well as Christians and homosexuals.

Wagner, a German of Russian origin, had been a representative of the AfD since 2015. He was a member of the state committee with responsibility for churches and religious communities.