FPO leader Herbert Kickl has been tasked with trying to lead the government, which would be the first to be led by a far-right party since World War II.
The President of Austria, Alexander Van der Bellen, has entrusted the leader of the far-right Freedom Party (FPO), Herbert Kickl, to form a coalition government after he asked the people to form an organization without the FPO. to fall unexpectedly at the end of the week.
Monday's announcement marks a major change for the president, a former leader of the left-wing Greens who have long opposed the FPO and opposed Kickl, but few options remained for him after officials failed to reach an agreement.
The eurosceptic, Russia-friendly FPO won last September's parliamentary elections with 29 percent of the vote.
Now he will start a conversation with his only friend, a Conservative People's Party (OVP), is seeking to lead a government for the first time since it was formed in the 1950s under the leadership of a former head of Hitler's SS.
“I have given him the task of starting negotiations with the People's Party to form a government,” Van der Bellen said in a televised address after meeting with Kickl, adding: “I did not do this lightly.”
“Kickl believes that he can find effective solutions… and he wants this position,” Van der Bellen said.
After the 56-year-old Kickl left his meeting with the president, hundreds of demonstrators, including Jewish students and left-wing activists, fired shots, whistled, chanted “Nazis out” and waved signs with words like “We don't want it.” Right-wing extremist Austria”.
Van der Bellen angered the FPO by not giving it the mandate to form a government immediately after the elections because no partner he could agree with came forward. This task fell to the OVP and its leader, Chancellor Karl Nehammer. OVP came second in the election.
Nehammer's efforts to forge a three-party agreement with bipartisanship and other moderate parties collapsed this week, prompting him to announce his resignation.
OVP for opening discussion
Analysts say a right-wing coalition with the Conservatives as junior partners is now more likely.
Nehammer insisted that his party cannot rule with Kickl, saying that the FPO leader is a conspiracy theorist and a security threat. With Nehammer gone, so is that red line.
His successor as leader of the OVP, Christian Stocker, said on Sunday that his party would join the coalition talks led by Kickl.
“We are at the beginning. If we are invited to these negotiations, the outcome of the negotiations is open,” OVP heavyweight Wilfried Haslauer, the governor of the Salzburg State who stood next to Stocker in his first speech to the press as elected leader, told the ORF reporter.
If these negotiations fail, a snap election could be held, and polls show that support for the FPO has grown since September.
In its election manifesto called Fortress Austria, the FPO called for “uninvited foreigners” to move in order to achieve an “equal” country by enforcing strict border control and suspending the right to asylum through emergency legislation.
It has also called for an end to Russian sanctions. The FPO strongly opposes Western military aid to Ukraine, and wants to bow to the European Sky Shield Initiative, a missile defense initiative launched by Germany.
Kickl criticized the “honors” in Brussels and called for some powers to be returned from the European Union to Austria.
The OVP and the FPO overlap on some of these issues, particularly in taking a hard line on immigration.