Berlin 28-02-2010
During yesterdays Bundestag parliamentary session, the’ Linke’ party members held up placards with the names of civilian victims of the German air force attack in Kunduz last year– and by doing so represented the majority of Germans who see nothing good coming from their countries long Afghan involvement.
Christine Buchholz, a member of parliament and deputy chairwoman of ‘ Die Linke’ – Left Party- said that Germany is taking part in a war being waged against the population of Afghanistan and that Germany has no right being there.
The protest came in the middle of a parliamentary debate on extending Germany’s nine-year military mission to Afghanistan by a further year.
The protest saw them banned temporarily from the Bundestag for breaching parliamentary rules and may have been a bit melodramatic.
However this was no routine vote – the’ Linke’ MPs held up some 70 signs with names of Afghani victims – they called it a dignified way to remember individual people with the names of those who have died.
The Bundestag has 622 members in total and in this case 429 MPs voted for and 111 against and 46 withheld their vote – which meant that in total 16 fewer votes in favour than last time – which will allow troop numbers to be increased by 850 to a total number of 5,350.
There is strong public resentment towards the Afghan mission and this has been further hardened since last year’s bombing of two petrol tankers near Kunduz.
In that incident which killed about 140 people -of which about 120 were innocent civilians- German troops took responsibility for what turned out to be a complete military, humanitarian and public relations disaster for Germany and its Army.
Around 70% of Germans want its soldiers to pull out, according to a December poll for ARD public television, up by 12 % in the last 3 months.
The right-wing CDU/CSU and FDP parties were joined by most – but not all – of the opposition Social Democrat Labour party.
In what can only be described as typical SPD opportunistic double-speak Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the SPD’s Bundestag leader said the party finally voted in favor of the government’s plan in order to help “set the points for ending the mission” [sic]in Afghanistan – whatever that illogical spin may mean.
The expulsion of the entire 76-member Left parliamentary party – a first in the Bundestag- shows how controversial Germany’s first post-war military deployment outside Europe is and remains.
Parliamentary expulsions in the Bundestag are a very rare occurrence but history has proven to be on the side of those who were expelled.
In 1949 the SPD chief Schumacher was thrown out for calling Konrad Adenauer the ‘Allied Chancellor’- an allusion to the fact that Adenauer was in fact a willing dupe of the US – which was true.
The most well-known expulsion was in 1984 during a heated exchange between the Bundestag president and the then Green Party MP Joschka Fischer.
“With permission, Mr President, you’re an asshole,” said Mr Fischer, who was then subsequently expelled for 2 days.
It had been reported at the time that Mr Fischer was in fact expelled for revealing a state-secret which all those in Parliment already knew to be the case!
