This Week

Austrian
CROSSROAD

European Union challenges right-wing
leader's bid for a government role.

Austria at the time was a neutral country seen as a
buffer between NATO and the Soviet Bloc. But Austria
joined the European Union in 1995, and E.U. sanc-
tions would have a real material effect on the country.
"What we have is a new situation," said Edward
Serotta, who directs the Vienna-based Central
European Center for Research and Documentation.
"The E.U. has never done anything like this before."
Serotta, like other observers, predicted that there
will be some backlash and resentment against the E.U.
threat, but said the changed international situation will
play a role in what.comes next. 'Austria was burned
once before. The country saw the isolation because of
Waldheim. It is possible that, if Haider keeps putting
his foot in his mouth, support for him will waver."
Indeed, an opinion poll in Profit magazine suggested
that 60 percent of Austrians believe Freedom Party

Related Editorial: page 37

RUTH E. GRUBER
Jewish Telegraphic Agency

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26

n unprecedented threat by the
European Union to penalize
Austria if, as planned, a far-
right party enters the govern-
ment brings back memories of a Jewish-
led campaign to isolate the country in the
1980s.
Then, Kurt Waldheim was elected pres-
ident despite revelations that he concealed
a Nazi past.
The controversy today over Jorg
Haider's Freedom Party bears similarities
to the Waldheim affair, but in many ways
it is strikingly different. For one thing,
much of Waldheim's support grew from a
resentful backlash against world Jewish
organizations — a reaction that was heavi-
ly, and openly, tinged with antisemitism.
This time, Jewish leaders have voiced
sharp criticism of Haider, but have mainly
stayed out of the spotlight.
Instead, Austria's 14 European Union
partners, vowing to rebuff any anti-demo-
cratic trends within Europe, have taken on
a battle to keep the Freedom Party, and
particularly Haider, out of the halls of
power.
For the moment, Austria defied the
threat. On Tuesday, the conservative
People's Party, led by Foreign Minister
Wolfgang Schuessel, agreed to form a gov-
ernment with the Freedom Party. Austrian
President Thomas Klestil could call new
elections or propose other alternatives to
block the move, and thus avoid European
Union retaliation.
The restrictions applied to Austria dur-
ing the Waldheim affair — including bar-
ring Waldheim from entering the United
States — hurt, but they were more humil-
iating than meaningful.

Right-wing hpoinr
Jorg Haider, Austrian
Freedom Party leader.

involvement in the government would damage Austria
abroad. Only a third expressed support for a center-
right coalition.
Thousands of Austrians took part in demonstrations
against Haider last fall.
Significantly the E.U. move, announced Monday,
came just days after leaders from 46 countries attended
an international conference on the Holocaust in
Stockholm which, among other things, called for more
preventive diplomacy and an early-warning system to
alert leaders to racist problems that could escalate.
"If a party which has expressed xenophobic views,
and which does not abide by the essential values of the
European family, comes to power, naturally we won't
be able to continue the same relations as in the past,
however much we regret it," Portuguese Prime
Minister Antonio Guterres, whose government current-
ly heads the European Union, told reporters Monday.
"Nothing will be as before."
Haider's Freedom Party won more than 27 percent •
in general elections last October, becoming the coun-
try's second-largest party and representing the biggest
breakthrough by a far-right party in Europe since the
end of World War II.
This fact, combined with Haider's charisma, person-
al background and political acumen — as well as
Austria's Nazi-tainted history — were all factors that
combined to prompt the move.
There were protests and warnings from many quar-
ters but no concerted threat of sanctions, for example,
when in 1994 three members of a neo-fascist party
were included in a center-right Italian government.
The Freedom Party's success and Haider's personal
rise are direct legacies of the Waldheim affair. For one
thing, part of the party's current electoral support
comes from voters fed up with the "grand coalition" of
the Social Democrats and the Conservatives, which
have ruled since 1986.
The controversy over Waldheim led to two trends in
Austria.
On one hand, it was the catalyst for a new openness
in facing Austria's role in the Holocaust and led to
numerous government initiatives supporting Jewish
causes and accepting responsibility for wartime perse-
cution of Jews.

