For the Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer the purpose of the trip was clear from the beginning. “It is my human duty to do everything possible to end this war or at least to create humanitarian corridors. In addition to the telephone, there must also be personal diplomacy, ”said the Austrian head of government before his departure for Moscow, where he had an interview with Vladimir Putin behind closed doors.
A journey discussed in its own way, given that the Austrian Chancellor is the first European to meet Putin since the invasion of Ukraine. The much vaunted neutrality of Vienna, a principle inscribed in the Constitution back in 1955, seems to have found application even today, in a slightly different key than in the past.
A few days ago in Kiev, after the meeting with Volodymyr Zelensky, the Chancellor had declared that “Vienna is militarily neutral, but we are not neutral when it comes to highlighting crimes and when it comes to the need to look and not turn away from ‘ other part “.
After meeting with Putin, Nehammer stressed that “this was not a friendly visit: I made it clear to President Putin that this war must finally end, because in a war there are only losers on both sides”. Statement reported by Austria Presse Agentur.
Nehammer’s breakthrough
The Chancellor knew full well that there would be no red carpet waiting for him in Moscow, despite being the first to break the diplomatic isolation.
Russia, in turn, is aware that Nehammer’s government has so far taken an ambiguous stance in foreign policy. On the one hand, he followed the choices of other European countries, deciding to expel four Russian diplomats from the country and also showing an aggressive face towards the regime stationed in the Kremlin, as evidenced by the words of Nehammer’s predecessor, the current minister of foreign Alexander Schallenberg, that he had declared before the meeting: «The hope that the Chancellor will tell Vladimir Putin face to face that he has morally lost the war». On the other hand, Vienna remains one of the most compliant countries towards Moscow: it has opposed any type of energy embargo against Russia, well aware that it is totally dependent on it (80% of its gas needs come from there. ).
Furthermore, as the Financial Times reports, its banking sector is heavily dependent on both Russian and Ukrainian. This is one of the reasons that explains the Austrian willingness to dialogue at all costs with both parties and yet, as Bild reports, this trip was not well received either by the Ukrainian authorities or by Poland and the Baltic countries, despite Brussels, Berlin and also Kiev had nevertheless been informed.
«To date it is an inappropriate trip. The war crimes that Russia is currently committing on Ukrainian soil are still ongoing. What we saw in Bucha has perhaps been repeated to a greater extent in Mariupol, even as the Russian military is trying to cover up the crimes. I don’t understand how it is possible to have a conversation with Putin right now, how it is possible to do business with him, ”said the deputy mayor of Mariupol Sergej Orlow. A criticism that the Ukrainian government also agrees on.
The differences with Kurz
Despite some ambiguities, the difference from the past is clear: the reference is to former Chancellor Sebastian Kurz, the Wunderkind of Austrian politics investigated for aiding corruption and appropriation of public funds, forced to leave politics.
The best example is his first coalition government with the far right of FPÖ, a party closely linked to the Kremlin which, by leading sensitive ministries such as the Interior and Defense, promptly led many Western intelligence agencies to suspend information sharing. with Vienna.
A link with almost paradoxical traits if one thinks of the evolution of the Ibizagate, a scandal into which Heinz-Christian Strache himself, leader of the FPÖ, fell thanks to a (fake) Russian heiress.
Much less amusing is the working relationship that many Austrian politicians have formed in recent years with the dome that guides Russia from the Kremlin, a virus that has more or less infected all the parties present in the Federal Assembly, the Bundesversammlung. Their names are known: the first to mention is certainly Karin Kneissl, former foreign minister in FPÖ share in the first Kurz government, who married in 2018 in Gamlitz, a small town in Styria, with Vladimir Putin as guest of honor, at the which the bride saw fit to offer a bow of deference.
It is therefore not surprising that today Kneissl is on the board of the Russian gas giant Rosneft and also a highly regarded columnist for Russia Today, for which he has quietly defined the first recognition of the Ukrainian separatist regions, that of February 23, “as something of the all normal in international law “. The war had not touched it in the slightest and the same also applies to the Social Democrat Christian Kern, former director general of the Öbb, the Austrian railways, and today passed to the Moscow state railways, who defined “not all Russian arguments on ‘ Ukraine are wrong »in an interview with Salzburger Nachrichten.
The list is missing “the Schröder of Austria”: Wolfgang Schüssel, former People’s Chancellor between 2000 and 2007 (years in which there was the first attempt to emancipate the extreme right, then led by Georg Haider) and a long-time member of the Russian oil holding Lukoil, left only in early March. “For me the aggression against Ukraine, the brutal attacks and the bombing of the civilian population have crossed a red line,” the former Chancellor told Reuters. Better late than never.
Historic Austrian neutrality
The roots of this Austrian desire not to take sides either side date back to the end of the Second World War. Indeed, there is a reason why Austria, like Ireland and Malta, is one of the few countries in the European Union not yet registered with NATO (beyond Sweden and Finland, historically neutral but which seem to be on the point to switch from associate members to full members in a matter of months).
For Vienna, the reasons date back to 1955, when the principle of permanent neutrality was set in the Constitution of the nascent Republic of Austria to avoid new foreign interference and to remain equidistant both from the West and from the East.
In these nearly 70 years the dangers have been many, as in 1956 when the Soviets attacked Hungary, a neighboring state, or in 1958, when US planes flew over Austrian territory in broad daylight to go to Lebanon to help the Christian president. Camille Chamoun Maronite but the principle is still valid, so much so that there is also a specially dedicated public holiday, October 25, a day in which there are hundreds of events and concerts specially dedicated.
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