BERLIN, Sept 15 (AFP) - A German doctor accused of swindling AIDS patients in Africa, Matthias Rath, has co-founded a political party that is contesting Sunday's general elections on a platform targeting big drugs companies.
Rath and others founded the Alliance for Health, Peace and Social Justice (AGFG) in June and has put up candidates in just two of Germany's 16 states, Saxony in the east and Lower Saxony in the west, party spokeswoman Diana Kriener said at its headquarters in Berlin on Thursday.
"We are neither from the left nor from the right politically, we stand for basic principles like the fight against big international pharmaceutical companies," she told AFP.
"Our party is still new and we have people throughout Germany but only in these states did we get the 2,000 signatures you need to take part in the vote. In Bavaria it was close."
The German electoral commission confirmed the party "is taking part in the elections".
The party is based in the offices of the Dr Rath Research Institute, a company selling vitamins that claims Rath has "made discoveries that rank among the most important in medicine."
These include claims he discovered how and why vitamin supplements can prevent cancer and cure heart disease and diabetes.
Rath is notorious in South Africa for campaigning against the use of anti-retroviral drugs by the country's millions of HIV carriers and AIDS victims and arguing that instead they should take vitamins.
He has become embroiled in lawsuits with the country's foremost AIDS activism group, the Treatment Action Campaign, which accuses him of misleading AIDS victims and using them as guinea pigs for his theories.
Rath writes in the AGFG's mission statement that he is not personally campaigning for his party in the German election because he prefers to concentrate on "fighting immuno-deficiency, tuberculosis and AIDS in Africa."
Kriener said the AGFG had "about 600 members" but refused to disclose whether the party was funded by Rath's foundation, saying: "We cannot talk about that."
She said it had put up one candidate in Lower Saxony and nine in Saxony, where is hopes to do well in the city of Dresden, where voting will take place on October because of the death of a neo-Nazi candidate.
"It will be very interesting for our party, which was formed quite late, to see how we do here," she said.
050915
AF050917
Copyright ©AFP 2005. All Rights Reserved. AFP articles contained on the AEGiS web site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published or broadcast without AFP's prior written permission. You may make one copy of each article for your personal, non-commercial use only; more copies would require AFP's prior written permission. obtained from the owners of any trademarks or copyrighted materials whose marks and materials are included in AFP photos or materials. Therefore you will be solely responsible for obtaining any and all necessary releases from whatever individuals and/or entities necessary for any uses of AFP stories, photos or graphics. http://www.afp.com/
AEGiS is a 501(c)3, not-for-profit, tax-exempt, educational corporation. AEGiS is made possible through unrestricted grants from Boehringer Ingelheim, Elton John AIDS Foundation, the National Library of Medicine, Bridgestone Firestone Trust Fund, and donations from users like you. Always watch for outdated information. This article first appeared in 2005. This material is designed to support, not replace, the relationship that exists between you and your doctor.
©1990, 2005 - AEGiS. AEGiS presents published material, reprinted with permission and neither endorses nor opposes any material. All materials appearing on AEGiS are protected by copyright as a collective work or compilation under U.S. copyright and other laws and are the property of AEGiS, or the party credited as the provider of the content.
