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On stage is Lutz Bachmann, Pegidas founder and leader, and his sidekick, riesling vintner Siegfried Daebritz. Bachmann fires up the crowd with the latest statistics about the large numbers of refugees arriving in Germany, raising the loudest response when he talks of the number of people whose asylum claims have been turned down. He says they have avoided deportation and are now roaming free.
When he tells his audience that a hotel, the Prinz Eugen, was bought by the city council on Monday for 3m (£2.16m) to house refugees, the crowd responds with loud jeers. I tell you, it wont be long before that burns, Schneider says, quickly adding he does not condone arson.
In front of him two young men with shaven heads, one of whom wears a hoodie bearing the phrase Dresden, my neighbourhood in gothic script, are also heard to mutter thatll soon be in flames.
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