Security coverage: AfD is allowed to go to the safety convention once more after being excluded | EUROtoday

After the AfD was excluded from the Munich Security Conference (MSC) prior to now two years, the get together’s specialist politicians will once more be capable of participate within the high-level knowledgeable assembly in 2026. In response to a request from the German Press Agency, a spokesman for the convention mentioned that invites had already been despatched to politicians from all events represented within the Bundestag earlier than the Christmas holidays. “In particular, specialist politicians from committees relevant to foreign and security policy were taken into account.” The choice was made by performing chairman Wolfgang Ischinger along with the convention’s board of trustees.

According to dpa info, AfD parliamentary group chief Alice Weidel has not but obtained an invite. However, the spokesman identified that the invitation course of had not but been accomplished. “The MSC reserves the right to invite other relevant politicians from home and abroad to the conference.”

The Munich Security Conference is the world’s most essential assembly of specialists on safety coverage – it should happen from February thirteenth to fifteenth in 2026. Dozens of heads of state and authorities in addition to international and protection ministers are anticipated on the Hotel Bayerischer Hof.

Heusgen excluded AfD and BSW

Defense and international coverage specialists from all parliamentary teams within the Bundestag are additionally often represented on the convention. In 2024 and 2025, the convention chief Christoph Heusgen, who has since left, determined to not invite the AfD. At the final convention in February – shortly earlier than the federal election – the BSW was additionally excluded. Heusgen justified this by saying that representatives of each events left the Bundestag throughout a speech by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. “This is the opposite of dialogue, and I don’t want to see anything similar at the conference,” he mentioned.

Ischinger is now altering course. He had led the convention for a few years earlier than Heusgen and can step in once more in 2026 as a result of ex-NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, who has already been appointed as future chairman, remains to be serving as Norwegian Finance Minister.

Vance met Weidel as a substitute of Scholz

US Vice President JD Vance sharply criticized the exclusion of the AfD in a sensational speech on the final safety convention. “There is no place for firewalls,” he mentioned, accusing European allies of endangering democracy. He then demonstratively met with AfD chief Weidel outdoors the convention grounds. However, a dialog with the then Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) didn’t happen.

CSU politician Hoffmann for exclusion

Before the AfD’s invitation for subsequent 12 months was publicly introduced, CSU regional group chief Alexander Hoffmann spoke out in a dpa interview in favor of constant to exclude the AfD subsequent 12 months. The chairman of the CSU representatives within the Bundestag justified this with the AfD’s contacts with Russia and China. “Information also flows there,” he mentioned. “And that’s why it would be a security risk.”Hoffmann additionally sharply criticized the latest journey by AfD politicians to the USA. “You go to the USA and then act as if you actually somehow have something to report politically and diplomatically,” he mentioned. “And then rounds take place where people badmouth Germany.” The CSU politician complained that important questions concerning the USA’s Ukraine coverage weren’t being requested. “I think this is anti-German diplomacy.”

AfD plans congress with US politicians

Six AfD members of the Bundestag traveled to Washington and New York in mid-December to deepen contacts with the federal government of US President Donald Trump and his Republican Party. During the journey, the deputy AfD parliamentary group chief and international coverage spokesman, Markus Frohnmaier, introduced a congress in Berlin in February to which representatives of the US State Department, members of Congress and US foyer organizations can be invited.