AUSTRIA COALITION WITH FAR-RIGHT SWORN IN

Investiture rounds off a triumphant year for Europe’s nationalists

VIENNA

WITH a heavy police presence keeping protestors away, Austria’s far-right was sworn in yesterday as part of the Alpine country’s new government, rounding off a triumphant year for Europe’s nationalists.

The new coalition was agreed on Friday by the conservative People’s Party (OeVP) and farright Freedom Party (FPOe), pledging to stop illegal immigration, cut taxes and resist European Union centralisation.

It will be led by Chancellor Sebastian Kurz, who took over OeVP in May and yanked it to the right, securing his party first place in October elections. At 31, he will be the world’s youngest leader.

At his side for the investiture by Austria’s president in the Hapsburg dynasty’s imperial palace in Vienna was FPOe chief Heinz-Christian Strache, 48, now vice-chancellor, and FPOe general-secretary Herbert Kickl, the new interior minister.

Strache had said Islam “has no place in Europe” and last year called German Chancellor Angela Merkel “the most dangerous woman in Europe” for her opendoor refugee policy.

On Sunday, Strache trumpeted to his 750,000 followers on Facebook that the new government would slash social benefits for asylum-seekers.

“It will no longer happen that migrants who have never worked here a single day or paid anything into the social system will get thousands of euros in welfare!”

More than 2,000 people took part in demonstrations yesterday, brandishing placards such as “refugees welcome” and “Nazis out” and “no Nazi pigs”.

A heavy police presence of about 1,500 officers, with helicopters overhead and water cannon trucks at the ready, blocked off the area near the Hofburg palace. AFP