On January 26, Mr. Michael Schnedlitz - General Secretary of the Austrian Freedom Party (FPO) - publicly and fiercely criticized Foreign Minister Beate Meinl-Reisinger. A wave of protests broke out immediately after Ms. Meinl-Reisinger announced the decision to increase humanitarian aid to Ukraine by 3 million euros (about 3.2 million USD).
In an exclusive interview with the Kurier newspaper, Mr. Schnedlitz used harsh words to attack the government's policy. He said that the act of taking Austrian people's tax money, in the context of the economic crisis weighing heavily on households, to move abroad is unacceptable.
The opposition leader declared that anyone who prioritizes throwing money into a system that he describes as corruption instead of worrying about the people in the country is no longer worthy of representing the Austrian people.
Not stopping at statements in the press, Mr. Schnedlitz also officially compared Ukraine to a bottomless bag. He accused the Vienna government of acting irresponsibly by pouring billions of USD into this Eastern European country without a clear result.
In a petition sent on January 25, representatives of the opposition asked the Austrian government to completely cut off all payments and aid to Kiev immediately.
The opposition's drastic move reflects the deep division within Austria over the conflict in Ukraine. This pressure seems to have affected even the heads of government. Austrian Prime Minister Christian Stocker was also recently forced to express a more cautious stance on Kiev's integration issue.
Speaking to the media, Prime Minister Stocker publicly opposed the proposals to accelerate the process of admitting Ukraine to the European Union (EU). He affirmed his tough stance that there will be no shortcuts for Kiev.
According to the head of the Austrian government, Ukraine can join the EU like countries in the Western Balkans, but must fully and strictly meet all strict economic and political standards, instead of being specially sanctioned for conflict reasons.
