Berlin, Jan. 24 (TNS): 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, converted to Islam, German media reported on Wednesday.
According to DW report, 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.
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.
Before joining the anti-Islam, anti-immigration party, he was a member of German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU).
Wagner refused to answer questions from the German daily newspaper Tagesspiegel, who first reported his conversion to the Islamic faith.
“That’s my private business,” he told the newspaper. But he said there had been no attempt by the party to force him to resign.
The AfD entered Germany’s national parliament, the Bundestag, for the first time following September’s national election — becoming the third largest party.
Wagner is not the first far-right politician to convert to Islam, Arnoud van Doorn was asked to leave Dutch far-right politician Geert Wilders‘ Freedom Party (PVV). It later emerged he had taken up the Muslim faith and traveled to Saudi Arabia to perform the Haj (a pilgrimage to Mecca), the Guardian reported.
