Tens of thousands pack into a protest in Hamburg against Germany's far right

Tens of thousands gathered in Hamburg on Friday for a demonstration against the far right, and organizers said the protest was ended early because the mass of people led to safety concerns

BERLIN -- Tens of thousands of people gathered Friday in Hamburg for a demonstration against the far right, and organizers said the protest was ended early because the mass of people led to safety concerns.

The event in Germany's second-biggest city appeared to be the biggest yet in a string of protests that has grown over the past week. They follow a report that extremists recently met to discuss the deportation of millions of immigrants, including some with German citizenship.

Media outlet Correctiv last week reported on the alleged far-right meeting in November, which it said was attended by figures from the extremist Identitarian Movement and from the far-right Alternative for Germany, or AfD. A prominent member of the Identitarian Movement, Austrian citizen Martin Sellner, presented his “remigration” vision for deportations.

Some demonstrations in cities around Germany, including one in Cologne on Tuesday, already have drawn far more participants than initially expected.

In Hamburg, police said that some 50,000 gathered on a lakeside promenade Friday afternoon, while organizers put the figure at 80,000 and said many people weren't able to squeeze into the venue, German news agency dpa reported.