Udo Ulfkotte

After his departure from FAZ in 2003, Ulfkotte became known for his conspiracy theories, for instance claiming on his Kopp Verlag blog that Barack Obama ordered the burning of bibles,[9] that African sportsmen would "slaughter whites" if allowed into Germany,[10] or that Muslims were waging "fecal jihad" against Europe.[11]

Ulfkotte was involved in the far right Pro Germany Citizens' Movement.[12] In June 2007, he signed the anti-Islam organisation Bundesverband der Bürgerbewegungen (BDB)'s "Wertheimer Appell" against the "creeping Islamisation" of Germany.[12] The BDB merged with Ulfkotte's Pax Europa[13] organisation to form Bürgerbewegung Pax Europa, but Ulfkotte left this in 2008 after an internal dispute.[12] Pax Europa was affiliated to the anti-Muslim Stop Islamisation of Europe (SIOE) alliance and approached the far-right Belgian party Vlaams Belang (VB) for their assistance.[14] It worked with them to organise an anti-Islamic 9/11 anniversary march in Brussels in 2007, but mayor Freddy Thielemans refused to licence it and it was eventually cancelled, leading to a split between Ulfkotte and SIOE.[14]

Ulfkotte had planned to run for the Hamburg local elections in 2008, as number two on the Centre Party's list,[15] but later withdrew in June/July 2007. In July 2007, Ulfkotte announced he would found a new national party,[13] but this effort failed.[16]

Ulfkotte was a speaker at rallies of the right-wing anti-Islam Pegida movement[17] and the right-wing party AfD.[18]

In 2014, Ulfkotte published the book Gekaufte Journalisten (German Bought Journalists: How Politicians, Intelligence Agencies and High Finance Control Germany’s Mass Media), in which he stated that the CIA and other secret services pay money to journalists to report stories in a certain light. According to Ulfkotte, the CIA and German intelligence (BND) bribe journalists in Germany to write pro-NATO propaganda articles, and it is well understood that one may lose their media job if they fail to comply with the pro-Western agenda. This is part of a larger pattern of media corruption he describes in the book.[19] The first English edition of the book, "Journalists for Hire," was never published, leading to speculation the book had been suppressed or "privished." [20] A new translation was finally released under the title "Presstitutes"[21]

Der Spiegel noted that "Ulfkotte's book was published by Kopp, a melting pot for conspiracy theorists. Kopp publishes works by ufologists, and by authors who claim the Americans destroyed the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center themselves in 2001. Ulfkotte's book was on the bestseller lists for months. "Bought Journalists" is the bible of all those who have renounced their faith in the German media. Ulfkotte's critics see the book as a vendetta against the FAZ, which he left on bad terms."[22]

Ulfkotte died from a heart attack on 13 January 2017 at the age of 56.[23] In April 2017, Jonas Schneider published an e-book which alleges that Ulfkotte's death was a concealed murder.[24]