Thousands of people have again taken to the streets mainly in cities in eastern Germany to protest against the government’s energy policy as prices soar.

Police said some 6,000 people had gathered in more than 12 cities in the north-eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern on Monday evening.

In the state capital Schwerin alone, some 1,600 came to demonstrate, while several hundred people attended rallies in the towns of Wismar, Parchim, Ludwigslust, Güstrow, Neubrandenburg, Neustrelitz and Waren an der Müritz, among others.

Thousands also took to the streets in the eastern states of Saxony, Thuringia, and Saxony-Anhalt.

After a month-long break, the extremist and Islamophobic Pegida movement met again for the first time for what it calls a “Great Dresden Evening Walk.”

Several hundred Pegida supporters gathered on Dresden’s Neumarkt square, while almost the same number of mainly young people attended a counter-protest.

In the city of Magdeburg, about 150 kilometres west of Berlin, some 1,100 people came to a gathering organised by the far-right Alternative for Germany party, police said.

Meanwhile in Leipzig, there were clashes between participants and counter-demonstrators during a protest, according to a police spokesperson.

The march, whose number of participants was reportedly in the “very low four-digit range,” was blocked by a counter-protest with several hundred participants.

(dpa/NAN)