More than 50,000 people attended a special open-air protest concert against the far-Right yesterday (MON) in Chemnitz, the German city that has been the scene of neo-Nazi rallies in recent days.

Huge crowds streamed into the small eastern city from across Germany to make a stand against the far-Right protests which saw foreigners hunted through the streets and neo-Nazis openly giving the Hitler salute last week.

Several of the country’s best known rock groups came together for a one-off concert against the extremists under the banner “We are more” — a direct reference to the far-Right chant of “We are the people.”

The numbers dwarfed the 11,000 who took part in rival far-Right and far-Left protests at the weekend and brought the city to a standstill. Mobile networks collapsed under the demand and there were concerns there would not be enough trains for people to get home.

Police refused permission for far-Right groups to stage rival protests on the grounds there was no space left in the city. Rallies in support of the concert also took place in Hannover and Kiel.