A Pegida defector claims the far-Right extremists spread ‘a pack of lies’ about migrants coming into the country to suit their ‘racist’ anti-immigration agenda.

Rene Jahn says the anti-immigration neo-Nazis ‘whip up’ Islamophobia by spreading ‘xenophobic’ falsehoods about the million refugees that have flooded into the country.

Whistleblower Jahn says lies like German kindergartens being banned from serving pork, Sharia Law being imposed, migrant sex assaults and stories of refugees breaking into a petting zoo and eating a goat all come from Pegida.

Whistleblower: Rene Jahn, 50, left Pegida in January 2015. The whistleblower has accused its leaders of anti-Muslim group Pegida of telling a 'pack of lies'

Thugs: He accused the group of using neo-Nazi skinhead thugs for demonstrations to put off left-wing activists from challenging them at rallies

Lifting the lid on the secretive extremist group’s inner workings, Jahn accused them of cynically exaggerating the scale of the migrant threat.

Revealing he left after the group was ‘hijacked’ by extremists, the defector said he is alarmed at the inflammatory rhetoric used by group leaders.

In an exclusive interview, he told MailOnline: ‘The things they say now are a pack of lies.

‘Churches are not being turned into mosques. The Rhineland is not a caliphate. Kindergartens are not banned from serving pork, and there is no Sharia police.’

Jahn, 50, who walked out in protest last January, said current leaders Tatjana Festerling and Lutz Bachmann search for a few ‘extreme’ examples of migrant troubles and ‘blow them out of all proportion'.

‘They exaggerate them, saying that it is like this in all of Germany,’ he added.

Accusing them of ‘artificially whipping up panic to further their own xenophobic agenda’, he went on: ‘Every time Angela Merkel says “refugees welcome” it is useful for Pegida. They exploit people’s fears and use it to gain support.’

Lies: He accused deputy leader Tatjana Festerling (above) of exaggerating isolated incidents of migrant violence to whip up Islamophobia to fit in with her xenophobic agenda

Rabble: Jahn says that most of the supporters who attend Pegida rallies are decent citizens but that some have been brainwashed by the leaders into believing everything they say

Exploited: Pegida has been accused of exploiting people’s fears and use it to gain support against the one million migrants who arrive in Germany last year

The father-of-one, who runs a maintenance company with his wife in Dresden, said that the Pegida leadership ‘encourages’ neo-Nazi hooligans at demonstrations.

‘They deny having any connection with neo-Nazis but that is a lie. There are neo-Nazi skinheads from the NPD at every single demonstration, and Pegida uses them to provide security for its rallies.

‘Many of the security hooligans who are there to scare Left-wing activists away are members of neo-Nazi groups. Pegida uses them unofficially as part of the structure.

Racist: Jahn left the group after leader Lutz Bachmann called immigrants 'dreckspack' or 'filth'

‘In the beginning, we spoke out against neo-Nazis. Nobody speaks out against them any more, instead they are quietly encouraged.’

Jahn says most people at Pegida demonstrations are concerned citizens who are not racist. But around a brainwashed quarter of them believe Bachmann is ‘Robin Hood’, and believe ‘every word he says’. That is why I am speaking out,’ he added.

Tatjana Festerling, the deputy leader of Pegida, dismissed Jahn’s allegations. ‘We are not exaggerating. The police, politicians and the lying press cover up the scale of the problem,’ she said.

‘It’s true that you can’t see Muslim migrants everywhere in Germany, but is is very bad in some areas. Should we wait until they are everywhere before we take action?’

When asked about Pegida’s alleged links to neo-Nazi skinheads, she said:

‘I like hooligans. They have been loyal to Pegida from the very beginning. It is true that they provide security at our events.

‘But the hooligans I know are just football fans who like battling with other men on the street. None of them are neo-Nazis.

'In Germany you need to show your passport to work in security, and the administration of Dresden would have refused neo-Nazis.'

She also criticised Jahn personally, branding him a 'narcissistic attention-seeker'.

Jahn left Pegida last year after Lutz Bachmann – who has since become the undisputed leader of the group – used the word ‘dreckspack’, or ‘filth’, to describe immigrants.

‘For several of the leaders, that was too much,’ he said. ‘We had a meeting and Lutz said that we didn’t belong in Pegida. He later tried to invite me back, but I said that his attitude was no longer OK and I left.

Anger: Members of the Dutch Pegida movement march through the city centre during a demonstration. Jahn told MailOnline: ‘In the beginning, we spoke out against neo-Nazis. Nobody speaks out against them any more, instead they are quietly encouraged'

Stand-off: An Irish branch of Pediga protested in Dublin. Jahn accuses the group of cultivating neo-Nazi links

Security: Jahn says most people at Pegida demonstrations are concerned citizens who are not racist. But around a brainwashed quarter of them believe Bachmann is ‘Robin Hood’, and believe ‘every word he says’. That is why I am speaking out,’ he added

Tough: A policeman arrests supporters of the Pegida movement (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the Occident) during a demonstration in Calais, northern France on February 6

‘When I was part of Pegida, we used to say that refugees were welcome but not economic migrants,’ he added. ‘Now they want to suspend the asylum system, and they say that every Muslim is bad.

‘In the summer, Geert Wilders [the Dutch far-Right politician] spoke at a Pegida rally. That shows the direction in which the movement is going.’

Festerling acknowledged that she holds a negative view of Muslims but denied that she is racist.

‘Last year, I hoped our well-integrated Muslims would stand with us against radical, rough, brutal Islam, but they did nothing, they remained quiet,’ she said.

‘They see themselves as all part of the same clan, the same family, the same umma,' she said, referring to the Arabic word to denote the wider Islamic community.

'So I think that Islam is against Western freedom and values. It’s not a race thing but it is a culture thing.'

Extremist: Accusing them of ‘artificially whipping up panic to further their own xenophobic agenda’, Jahn said: ‘Every time Angela Merkel says “refugees welcome” it is useful for Pegida. They exploit people’s fears and use it to gain support’