A German town has sparked fury by banning new Holocaust memorial stones.
Heidenau, near Dresden, voted 13-6 to bar more Stolpersteine, or ‘stumbling stones’, from being installed on the town’s public streets.
Councillors from Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) joined forces with the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) to pass the measure at the city council.
The decision has triggered anger from Holocaust remembrance groups, politicians and the artist behind the memorial project.
“This is a transparent and despicable attempt to drive Nazi victims in Heidenau out of the city once again and dispose of them where, according to the AfD, their memory has belonged a long time ago — at the cemetery,” said Christoph Heubner, executive vice-president of the International Auschwitz Committee.
Felix Banaszak, co-leader of Germany’s Green Party, described the CDU’s cooperation with the AfD as “a scandal”.
He said that, amid the rise of right-wing extremism, everything must be done “to keep alive the memories of those who were persecuted and killed.”
The vote has also drawn criticism from Gunter Demnig, the 78-year-old German artist who began the Stolpersteine project in the 1990s.
“After the electoral successes of the AfD, something like this was completely expected,” Demnig was quoted as saying by the DPA news agency.
He vowed to continue his work, saying he would “push on now more than ever”.
Stolpersteine are small concrete cubes topped with brass plaques. They are usually laid into pavements outside the homes where victims of Nazi persecution once lived.
Each stone carries a victim’s name and details, making the memorial personal and local rather than confining remembrance to museums or cemeteries.
The project has grown into the world’s largest decentralised Holocaust memorial. More than 100,000 stones have been installed across Germany and other European countries, including Britain, France, the Netherlands and Austria.
Heidenau already has five Stolpersteine.
Four were installed in 2023 following research by pupils at a nearby school, while another commemorates former Heidenau mayor Paul Gröger.
The council’s latest decision follows a request for seven more stones.
Those behind the ban argued that placing the memorials in pavements is disrespectful because people inevitably walk over the names of Holocaust victims. They said victims should instead be commemorated at a cemetery.
The AfD and CDU in Heidenau’s city council claim that it is disrespectful to the dead to have “passers-by walking over or even stepping onto the names of the victims”.
Supporters of Stolpersteine reject that argument, saying the stones are deliberately placed where victims once lived to confront people with the history of their own streets and neighbourhoods.
Heidenau’s administration had opposed a general ban, arguing that public memorials make remembrance visible and accessible in everyday life.
CDU politician and Education Minister Karin Prien also condemned the decision, calling it a “scandal” and warning against moving Jewish remembrance out of public spaces.
Israeli Ambassador to Germany Ron Prosor said: “Whoever erases the victims from the past erases the past itself.”
The existing stones in Heidenau are not affected by the decision and will remain in place.
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