Berlin, 7 July 2023 (dpa/MIA) - Germany's far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party has reached a new all-time high in popularity, according to latest polling conducted by state broadcaster ARD.

The party improved by two percentage points, meaning 20% of all those surveyed supported them, the survey showed on Thursday. This would make them the second strongest party in the country currently.

Other polling companies also recently reported rising poll figures for the anti-immigration party, with numbers between 17 and 21%.

The AfD has traditionally been on the fringes of German politics. Recently, however, an intense political debate has sprung up in Germany about the rise of the far-right.

The AfD won its first election for district administrator in the state of Thuringia in June, when Robert Sesselmann was elected in Sonneberg. He was the first AfD candidate to win an election of this kind.

That was followed last week by a first-time victory in winning a mayor's seat in a small town in the nearby state of Saxony-Anhalt.

Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt are two of the six German states that made up the former communist state of East Germany, a region which generally has higher support for the far-right.

Germany's conservative Christian Democrats (CDU) together with Bavaria's Christian Social Union (CSU) polled highest in the ARD poll, at 28%, moving down by one percentage point.

The Social Democrats' (SPD) popularity remained unchanged at 18%, and the Greens polled at 14%, marking their weakest result since September 2018.

The liberal Free Democrats (FDP) and hard-left Die Linke (The Left) remained at 7% and 4%, respectively.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz's SPD are in a coalition government with the Greens and pro-business FDP.

Photo: MIA archive