Charges justify ban on German far-right party-critics

BERLIN, March 26 (Reuters) - Critics of Germany's far-right National Democratic Party (NPD) say charges against its leader for inciting racial hatred will strengthen their bid to ban the party which backs some of Hitler's policies.

State prosecutors said on Tuesday they had formally charged NPD boss Udo Voigt for comments about a dark-skinned German soccer player before the 2006 World Cup.

The case could boost efforts to outlaw the NPD after a previous attempt failed in 2003, said Sebastian Edathy, a Social Democrat who heads the home affairs parliamentary committee.

He told the Frankfurter Rundschau newspaper the charges proved the "inhuman attitudes and policies of the NPD" and could be an important part of the jigsaw in seeking a ban.

In comments widely reported in other German media, he also said interior ministers of Germany's 16 states were set to discuss the matter at their next meeting in April.

Last December, state ministers agreed to look at ways of cutting off funds to far-right organisations.

Represented in two state assemblies, the NPD gets state funding and its membership has grown in the last few years.

Calls for a new attempt to ban the party, especially among senior Social Democrats who share power with Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives, have increased after a recent rise in racially motivated crime from far-right radicals.

The NPD campaigns on euphemisms such as defending German cultural heritage and its followers say they support Iran's president who has said Israel should be wiped of the map.