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| Neo-Nazis fail to buy hotel for conference center
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Jürgen Rieger, who has written a book on eugenics and defended prominent neo-Nazis including Holocaust denier Ernst Zündel, had made clear that he wanted to buy the hotel to use it as a neo-Nazi conference centre
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BERLIN (EJP)--- A bid by neo-Nazis to turn a German hotel into a conference centre for extreme right-wing extremists has failed.
The extremist Wilhelm Tietjen Foundation for Fertilization Ltd had expressed an interest in buying the Hotel am Stadtpark in Delmenhorst in Lower Saxony.
Its controversial lawyer Jürgen Rieger, who has written a book on eugenics and defended prominent neo-Nazis including Holocaust denier Ernst Zündel, had made clear that he wanted to buy the hotel to use it as a neo-Nazi conference centre.
Hotel owner Günter Mergel, who had initially admitted that he was entertaining an offer from Rieger, said that, if he did not get the price he wanted for the hotel, he would be happy to lease the property to the Wilhelm Tietjen Foundation.
But the moves led to huge protests by locals, who said that they were outraged at the prospect of the building being sold to right-wing extremists.
But last month, Mergel admitted that, after Rieger’s initial interest, the lawyer had gone silent on the deal and that neither he nor the foundation had made any further approaches.
Deal with city council
The local city council, which had also protested about plans to sell the property to Rieger, has negotiated a deal to buy the hotel from Mergel for three million euros.
Spokesman for town authorities Timo Frers said: "The deal will be finalized after some remaining details are worked out."
The city council’s offer had been its last attempt to wrestle the hotel from the hands of the extremists.
Under the deal, 1.6 million euros will be paid from city funds, 500,000 will come from loans, and 920,000 euros have been raised by a citizens’ initiative called "For Delmenhorst".
The bid by the right-wing group to buy the Delmenhorst hotel is not the first time that it has made headlines over its property purchases.
The foundation, which has its registered headquarters in London, bought a 19th-century manor house from the German army in 2004 to turn it into a reproduction and fertilisation research centre.
The group is named after Wilhelm Tietjen - a fiercely-loyal member of the Nazi party after he joined it in the 1930s and who then went on to make a fortune on the stock market after the war. He died in 2002.
Rieger, 59, is just as controversial as the group he represents. In 1995, he bought a farmhouse in Sweden with the intention of creating a farm collective for members of the "Nordic blond race".
He also heads the "Germanic Faith Community for Life Creation" group, which has an alleged focus on promoting the Aryan race. The lawyer is also chairman of the "Society for Biological Anthropology, Eugenics and Behavioural Research."
He is known to admire British fascist Oswald Moseley and has written a book on racial purity and his dream of producing "white giants" and the importance of wiping out the "disastrous effects of bastardising races".
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