Neo-Nazis piggyback on the protest bandwagon against Schroeder

Long consigned to the fringes of German political life, a number of right-wing extremist groups are using growing resentment towards Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's economic reforms to take their radical views mainstream.

For weeks, tens of thousands of Germans have taken to the streets each Monday to protest against the government's plans to reform the country's labour market and cut unemployment benefits for the long-term jobless.

The demonstrations have been supported by a broad leftist coalition including the successor to East Germany's communist party, unionists and globalisation opponents.

But radical right-wingers, including those with ties to neo- Nazis and skinhead groups, decided to piggyback their agendas onto the protests to tap the public's anger ahead of elections in three German states this month.

'The heated mood of protest at the moment is driving a lot of people to both the extreme left and the extreme right,' said Oskar Niedermayer, a political scientist at the Free University in Berlin.

The Monday demonstrations, modelled on the weekly protests that helped bring down East Germany's communist regime in 1989, have quickly become the preferred venue for anyone opposed to Mr Schroeder's efforts to overhaul Germany's generous yet untenable social welfare system.