Germany's far-Right is set to increase its power base in state elections this weekend, securing a historic foothold in a regional parliament for the third time in two years.

Some of their campaign slogans, such as "working for the people" and "a future instead of the unemployment office", could belong to any mainstream party. But at their rallies, after condemning globalisation and Turkish accession to the European Union, they openly state their more extreme ideas: that the Jews were responsible for the Holocaust, or that Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert should be tried for war crimes in The Hague.

In the north-eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, which votes along with Berlin on Sunday, the NPD is expected to gain between seven and 10 per cent of the vote, overcoming the necessary five per cent hurdle to enter local parliament for the first time. (The party is also represented in the eastern state of Saxony, while the far-Right DVU is represented in Brandenburg.)

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