Berlin Wall anniversary brings East German nostalgia warning

German officials used the 65th anniversary of the start of Berlin Wall construction on August 13 to warn against nostalgia for communist East Germany, weeks before state elections in eastern Germany where the far-right Alternative for Germany is expected to make gains.

Culture Minister Wolfram Weimer said extremists on the left and right were trying to downplay the crimes of East German governments. Evelyn Zupke, the federal commissioner for victims of the German Democratic Republic, warned that a nostalgic narrative could blur the reality of dictatorship.

The warnings came after AfD figures in Saxony-Anhalt used East German symbolism during the campaign. The party's lead candidate there, Ulrich Siegmund, recently sang the old East German national anthem at a campaign event alongside national co-leader Tino Chrupalla and has used other nostalgic imagery. Polls indicate the AfD could do well enough in Saxony-Anhalt to form its first state government.

East German authorities began building the Berlin Wall on August 13, 1961, and later fortified it with watchtowers, patrols and guard dogs. More than 100 people died trying to escape to the West before the Wall fell in November 1989.

Parliamentary president Julia Kloeckner said the Wall still shaped political attitudes in Germany, including over migration, Covid measures and Russia. She said that after reunification, little changed for West Germans, while “everything changed” for East Germans.