The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) has won a decisive victory in Germany's eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt, far ahead of mainstream rivals,
BBC reports.
But preliminary results show it has gained 43.8% of the vote to the conservative CDU's 17.2%, falling short of an outright majority needed to govern alone. Tricky negotiations on who will run the state lie ahead.
AfD's charismatic leader in the state, Ulrich Siegmund, said it was "sensational" and added that the party had won a mandate to govern.
No far-right party has controlled a German state since World War Two, and governing at state level would mean powers over policing, local education and culture.
Saxony-Anhalt has a small population of 2.1 million and the AfD in the state is assessed by domestic intelligence as "right-wing extremist", a classification rejected by Siegmund, 35.
He along with joint national leaders Alice Weidel and Tino Chrupalla were overjoyed as exit polls revealed they were on track to score more than double the party's 2021 result.
