"New York Times" reports on security agency shenanigans in Austria

This is a surprisingly good report on how far-right groups, including the junior partner party (FPÖ) in the national governing coalition, are compromising Austrian security operations: Katrin Bennhold, As Far Right Rises, a Battle Over Security Agencies Grows New York Times 05/07/2019. "Suprising" because it isn't superficial in its account of Austrian politics.

Austria hasn't had a terrorist attack since the 1990s. But as this article shows, not only has the current government compromised operations that monitor violence-inclined far right groups. But this is the most detailed report I've seen on how other European intelligence agencies are flat-out withholding security information from Austrian intelligence because they don't trust Austria to adequately protect sources and information. The ties to far-right groups is one big concern, the FPÖ's Russian connections are another.

This has been a big issue in recent weeks in Austrian politics and in the EU elections under way: "Such concerns gained urgency in recent weeks after it emerged that the avowed extremist charged with killing 51 Muslims at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, had donated money to the Austrian spokesman of Generation Identity, a far-right youth movement." The FPÖ pointedly uses a xenophobic slogan of the Identitarians, "population exchange" (Bevölkerungsaustausch) to oppose immigration.

(Alle Übersetzungen aus dem Englischen in diesem Beitrag sind meine.)

The Times also recounts this event: "The Freedom Party [FPÖ] has a cooperation agreement with President Vladimir V. Putin’s United Russia party [signed in 2016] and last summer, the Freedom Party-backed foreign minister [Karin Kneissl] invited Mr. Putin to her wedding." That actually doesn't give a full picture of how theatrically deferential she was to Putin there. Kneissl has otherwise played an unusually low-key role for an Austrian Foreign Minister. My own guess is that some other EU countries quietly passed the word that they wouldn't deal with her in the normal way because of her wedding performance with Putin.

This is a screenshot from the RT video of Kneissl's wedding dance with Putin that ended with her literally bowing down on her knee in front of him:

Let's just say that isn't the normal protocol.

RT is now often identified in the EU and American press as a Russian propaganda channel. But they were the only press covering it, because they were invited but no Austrian media were, not even the outlets that are basically partisan FPÖ ones. Chancellor Sebastian Kurz (ÖVP) and Vice Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache were also at the wedding. Kurz served briefly as Foreign Minister and is known of his obsession with message control. There's no way this bowing to Putin wasn't carfully planned in advance. The full RT video report is included in this post of mine from last year, Putin drops by in middle Europe 08/19/2018.

(A German version of this post can be found here.)