Minister in Anti-Semitic Row Sacked

Martin Hohmann, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) politician who caused outrage with remarks in October which were widely regarded as being anti-Semitic, has been thrown off a parliamentary commission on Nazi-era forced labor, officials said on Sunday. Hohmann, who was forced to apologize on Saturday for a speech that described the Jews as a race of perpetrators, was sacked from the parliamentary compensation commission after he told the Fuldaer Zeitung newspaper that he had only spoken the truth. A government spokesman has called the remarks "an unacceptable and intolerable gaffe." Further action could see Hohmann excluded from the CDU’s parliamentary group in the Bundestag, or lower house of parliament, if the Green party and Germany's Central Council of Jews get their way.