After Germany, protests against far-right and racism spread to neighboring Austria today, with the participation of tens of thousands of people.

In Vienna, 35,000 people, according to the police, or 80,000 according to the organizers, gathered in the late afternoon outside the Parliament on the famous Ring boulevard, braving the rain. “We are here, all together, to defend democracy and stand up against the extremist movements that are spreading in Europe,” 25-year-old student Elena Tiefenbeck told AFP. “And so that the past does not repeat itself,” she added, referring to the fact that the far-right party FPÖ comes first in the polls, ahead of the next parliamentary elections.

The prospect is “very worrying” for Barbara Braubeck, a 53-year-old psychotherapist, because “it would further divide society”.

“(Herbert) Kickl is a Nazi” read a poster about the leader of the far-right, anti-immigrant party who wants to be “Volkskanzler”, meaning “people’s chancellor”, an expression used by Adolf Hitler and causing much comment in the Austrian press.

The demonstration, under colorful umbrellas, was organized by the Fridays for Future movement – which denounces the far-right’s opposition to taking action to tackle climate change – and two other organisations, one of which defends Black Lives Matter in Austria and the other asylum seekers. The Social Democrats, the Greens and many trade unions participated in the demonstrations.

“Some of us have already packed our bags or are thinking about which country to flee to,” said councilor Mireille Ngoso, who is of Congolese descent and an activist with the Black Voices in Austria group.

Demonstrations were also organized in Salzburg and Innsbruck.

As in Germany, it was prompted by the January 10 revelation by the German investigative journalism outlet Correctiv that a meeting of far-right and extremist organizations was organized in Potsdam in November, where a plan to mass deportation of foreigners or people of non-German origin was discussed.

Among those who took part in the “summit of shame”, as some media called it, were members of the AfD and Austria’s Martin Zellner, a leader of the “identity movement”. Zellner presented a plan to deport to North Africa some 2 million people: asylum seekers, foreigners and also German citizens who have not “assimilated”, according to Correctiv.

More than 200 demonstrations are planned for this weekend in Germany.