Topical News Lessons

Fill the gaps using these words: 
reputation 
attractive 
federal 
Holocaust 
unemployed 
skinheads 
1. 
If something is ___________ it is very pleasant in some way. 
2. 
If a person is ___________, he or she has no job. 
3. 
The ___________ was the organised killing of millions of people during 
World War II. 
4. 
___________ are young men who cut off all their hair. 
5. 
___________ is the opinion other people have about how good or bad 
someone or something is. 
6. 
___________ means connected to the national government of a country.
Find the answers to these questions in the article: 
1. Where 
is 
Saxon 
Switzerland? 
2. 
What is the NPD? 
3. 
How many NPD MPs are in the Saxon parliament? 
4. 
How many people died in the bombing of Dresden? 
5. 
When was the bombing of Dresden? 
6. 
When did Adolf Hitler come to power? 
Now look in the text and check your answers. 

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©
Macmillan Publishers Ltd 2005 
Taken from the news section in 
www.onestopenglish.com
Rebirth of the Reich land 
Luke Harding 
The German region of Saxon Switzerland is 
very attractive with many hills, rivers and 
forests. During the communist period, Saxon 
Switzerland was in East Germany and was well 
known as a centre for walking and water sports 
like kayaking. Now it is famous for a different 
reason. Sixty years after the end of the Second 
World War, Germany's neo-Nazi political party 
is coming back. 
Last September there were federal elections in 
the Saxony region. The neo-Nazi National Party 
of Germany (NPD) won 9.2% of the vote, 
giving it 12 MPs in the new Saxon parliament 
in Dresden. Now members of the NPD are 
trying to do things which make people notice 
them. Last month, for example NPD MPs 
walked out of the parliament during a one-
minute silence in memory of the victims of the 
Holocaust in the Second World War. Last 
weekend the party and its supporters marched 
in memory of the 35,000 Germans killed during 
the attack on Dresden 60 years ago by British 
and American planes. According to Holger 
Apfel, the NPD's 33-year-old leader, the attack 
on Dresden during February 13-14, 1945, was a 
war crime. 
Most German politicians are surprised by the 
success of the NPD but this success has been at 
a time when more than 5 million Germans are 
unemployed. Many people do not trust the main 
political parties. Edmund Stoiber, the 
conservative leader of Bavaria's CSU party, 
says that the situation in present-day Germany 
is like the situation in 1932, when millions of 
people were unemployed. One year later Adolf 
Hitler came to power. 
Frieder Haase is the mayor of Koenigstein, a 
town 30km south of Dresden. He says the 
situation is different now and it is not like 1932. 
He says he wants to stop 1933 from happening 
again. Koenigstein, with a population of 3,200, 
is a small town in the middle of Saxon 
Switzerland. During last September's elections 
almost 20% of its population voted for the 
NPD. Who, then, are the NPD's supporters? 
"They look like you and me. They are 
completely normal," says Haase. "They work 
on building sites. They are women shop 
assistants. They don't look like skinheads."
German newspapers have different explanations 
for the success of the NPD. They say it is 
because Saxony was communist until 1989 or 
because 18% of the population is unemployed. 
They also say that many people do not like the 
red-green government in Berlin. The NPD, 
meanwhile, is working hard to increase its 
support, particularly among young people - 
with barbecues, discos and canoeing trips.
The NPD's new MPs don't look like skinheads 
either. They wear suits; they are in their 30s; 
and they are very polite. Holger Apfel says that 
other political parties do not take him seriously. 
"We have very good local structures" he says. 
The NPD's views are popular with some 
German voters – and above all its argument that 
it is time Germans stopped feeling guilty about 
being German.
Frieder Haase and other Koenigstein citizens 
are fighting against the town's reputation as a 
neo-Nazi centre. "The Nazi period is not going 
to happen again," Haase says. "Germany lost 
the First World War and in 1933 it was a 
broken country. Then a big, powerful man 
arrived - Adolf Hitler. Things are different 
now." 
The Guardian Weekly
18-02-2005, page 20 

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©
Macmillan Publishers Ltd 2005 
Taken from the news section in 
www.onestopenglish.com