Candidate for chancellor Friedrich Merz, leader of the center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU), categorically rejected any possible cooperation with the far-right party "Alternative for Germany" (AfD), DPA reported, referring to an interview Merz gave last night on public television channel ARD, BTA reports.
"Let me repeat for the record. As long as I am leader, there will be no cooperation with the CDU in Germany," Merz said.
The reasons are clear, he added. "We cannot work with a party that is xenophobic, anti-Semitic, has right-wing extremists and criminals in its ranks, plays with Russia and wants to leave NATO and the EU."
The German counterintelligence agency, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, has put the AfD under surveillance on the grounds of being an alleged right-wing extremist organization.
By criminals, Merz probably means the leader of the AfD party organization in the state of Thuringia, Björn Höcke, a radical far-right politician known in Germany for his controversial statements, DPA notes.
He has been convicted twice by a court for knowingly using a banned Nazi slogan in his speeches.
Merz added that any cooperation with the AfD would be tantamount to "the CDU selling its soul".
Asked to comment on whether he would really kept his promise, Merz replied: "Yes, I will keep it. I stand by my words with all my responsibility as chairman of the CDU".
Friedrich Merz is the favorite to be Germany's next chancellor in the February 23 election, replacing current prime minister Olaf Scholz, whose three-party coalition collapse triggered the snap vote next month.