01 April 2016
Support our work: become a Friend of Statewatch from as little as £1/€1 per month.
"Austria's government was licking its wounds Monday after a historic debacle that saw the opposition anti-immigrant far-right triumph in a presidential ballot two years before the next scheduled general election.
According to preliminary results, Norbert Hofer of the Freedom Party (FPOe) came a clear first with 36 percent of the vote, while candidates from the two governing parties failed to even make it into a runoff on May 22.
The result means that for the first time since 1945, Austria will not have a president backed by either Chancellor Werner Faymann's Social Democrats (SPOe) or their centre-right coalition partners the People's Party (OeVP).
"This is the beginning of a new political era," FPOe leader Heinz-Christian Strache said after what constituted the best-ever result at federal level for the former party of the late Joerg Haider, calling it a "historic result"."
See: Austrian government in shock as far-right triumphs (Yahoo! News, link) and Austria’s far-right wins first round of presidential vote (EUobserver, link).
Over the weekend changes to Austria's asylum law were criticised by Council of Europe Commissioner for Human rights, Nils Muižnieks, who said that proposed changes under discussion in Parliament would be out of line with international standards. The interview is online in German here (ORF, link).
The changes would mean that "the government will only accept cases of refugees facing threats to their safety in a neighbouring transit country or whose relatives are already in Austria." See: NGOs slam Austria's asylum law changes (The Local, link)
Spotted an error? If you've spotted a problem with this page, just click once to let us know.
Statewatch does not have a corporate view, nor does it seek to create one, the views expressed are those of the author. Statewatch is not responsible for the content of external websites and inclusion of a link does not constitute an endorsement. Registered UK charity number: 1154784. Registered UK company number: 08480724. Registered company name: The Libertarian Research & Education Trust. Registered office: MayDay Rooms, 88 Fleet Street, London EC4Y 1DH. © Statewatch ISSN 1756-851X. Personal usage as private individuals "fair dealing" is allowed. We also welcome links to material on our site. Usage by those working for organisations is allowed only if the organisation holds an appropriate licence from the relevant reprographic rights organisation (eg: Copyright Licensing Agency in the UK) with such usage being subject to the terms and conditions of that licence and to local copyright law.