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PARIS - A spectacular advance by anti-immigrant, far-right groups in elections in Austria yesterday will raise questions about the country's stability and fuel concerns about the lure of the xenophobic siren song in Europe.
Two extreme right groups together picked up 29 per cent of the vote for Parliament, while two centrist parties, locked in a feud-riddled governing alliance over the past 18 months, polled their lowest scores since the end of World War II.
The Freedom Party under Heinz-Christian Strache gained 18 per cent, an increase of 7 percentage points over the last ballot in October 2006, and Joerg Haider's Alliance for the Future of Austria nearly tripled its score, to 11 per cent, according to preliminary official figures.
Both targeted working class voters alienated with the establishment parties.
The Social Democratic Party held on to first place, with 30 per cent of votes cast, a fall of more than five points.
The centre-right Austrian People's Party lost hugely in the swing to the radical right, falling 8 percentage points to 26 per cent.
The Greens slipped slightly, to about 10 per cent.
"The Social Democrats and People's Party have been punished and rejected," declared Strache to rousing cheers as he challenged the ruling parties to say why his party should be excluded from Government.
The snap election was called in July after a row over tax reforms and inflation triggered the collapse of a long-paralysed "grand coalition" led by chancellor Alfred Gusenbauer, a Social Democrat.
Their alliance took six months to forge after the last elections, and observers predict it will take a long time for the next Government to be cobbled together.
For the time, at least, the two big parties say a coalition with the two far-right groups is beyond the pale. This means the likely core will be the two main parties plus a smattering of smaller groups, although whether such a team could work or even survive long is being openly questioned.
"I think a grand coalition is still the most likely, but it would be relatively weak in terms of its legitimacy," said Richard Luther, a specialist at Keele University, Britain.
The Freedom Party and the Alliance for the Future of Austria were once a single party, but split acrimoniously in 2005.
For now they have refused to join forces, although there is a clear temptation to team up and become the second largest party.
In 1999, the Freedom Party, then led by Haider, secured 27 per cent of the vote and eventually entered the Government as a junior member with the People's Party.
Statements he had made that were construed as anti-Semitic or backing Adolf Hitler's labour policies earned Austria a prolonged spell of EU diplomatic sanctions.
Haider has toned down his rhetoric since then, but Strache has stuck to a hard line that has gone down well with poorer voters.
He wants a halt to immigration, a ministry for repatriating foreigners and the return of powers handed to the EU, which he said were conceded by "clowns" and "traitors". He has also made a string of anti-Islamic statements ("the minaret has no place in Austria") and called for the banning of full-length Islamic dress, which he said made Muslim women look like "female ninjas".
"We can't allow ourselves to become a minority in our own country and then watch as candidates of Turkish origin become district chiefs or mayors," he said at a rally.
The Germany daily the Sueddeutsche Zeitung said the "right-wing populists" had done well by reaping a mood of discontent and by heaping blame on foreigners and other countries. but the irony was that Austria was wealthy, unlike in the 1930s when it became an ally of Hitler.
"The core of Austria's disaster is social insecurity in one of Europe's wealthiest countries."
Inflation reached 3.9 per cent in July, its highest in 15 years. It fell last month to 3.6 per cent. Economic growth is forecast by the Government to ease to 1.4 per cent next year.
The unemployment rate, at 4.2 per cent of the workforce, is the fifth-lowest of the EU economies.
According to the GFK market research group, Austrians, after the British, were the most concerned about immigration and integration in Europe, with one in five naming it a top worry.
About a sixth of the Austrian population is of immigrant background, particularly from the former Yugoslavia or Turkey.
Inflation, jobs and crime are common fears across europe, its poll suggested.
GOING TO EXTREMES
HEINZ-CHRISTIAN STRACHE
Leader of far right Freedom Party of Austria. Strache has spent the last two years in the opposition. Born in Vienna on June 12, 1969.
Trained to become a dental technician and has been an active party member since 1991. Party leader since 2005.
Party platform:
* Halting immigration
* Preventing asylum seekers being allowed to settle in Austria.
JOERG HAIDER
Leader of the right-wing Alliance for the Future of Austria.
Celebrated his biggest political triumph as chief of the Freedom Party, which won 27 per cent of the vote in 1999 elections. Has toned down his rhetoric. Currently governor of Carinthia.
Party platform:
* Lowering taxes
* Immediately expelling asylum seekers and foreigners who commit crimes.
- AP
