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The successor of the Austrian far-right leader Jörg Haider was dismissed yesterday after he revealed a “special” relationship “far beyond” friendship with his former mentor. In emotional interviews with the national broadcaster and a tabloid newspaper Stefan Petzner spoke openly about his affair with Haider, who died at the age of 58 in a high-speed car crash after heavy drinking session at a gay club this month. Haider’s party, the Alliance for the Future of Austria, captured 11 per cent of the vote in national elections last month . “He was the man of my life. Our relationship went far...

VIENNA (AFP) — Outspoken Austrian far-right leader Joerg Haider, who sparked international outrage with comments praising Nazi policies, died on Saturday when his car veered off the road. ..................................... He was elected again but in 1995 said the feared Waffen-SS should be "honoured." New criticism erupted when he told the Austrian parliament that Nazi concentration camps were just "disciplinary camps." .......................................... Media-savvy, he was rarely out of the limelight, offering recently to mediate hostage crises in North Africa with his friend Seif al-Islam, son of Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi, or forcibly removing bilingual street signs in Carinthia, which has a...

(Original article in Swedish. Translated by SB) Austrian party leader Jörg Haider killed in car accident The Austrian party leader Jörg Haider was killed in a car accident early Saturday morning. The governor of the Austrian province Kärnten, and party leader for BZÖ (The Union for Austria’s Future) Jörg Haider was killed in a traffic accident early Saturday in Klagenfurt, capital of Kärnten, it was reported by the news agency APA. The 58 year old Haider was driving his service car when it for unknown reasons left the road. Haider suffered severe chest and head injuries and died shortly after...

One week and two days after the FBI began investigating the Joel Hinrichs case, the feds seemingly have stopped releasing information about what they have learned. It’s time the FBI opened its files and provided The Daily, other media and the greater public with some of the answers it undoubtedly has, for more than one reason. First, the public wants to know. Second, and almost more importantly, the longer this silence continues, the more students, faculty and the nation become “certain” in their “knowledge” of what has happened. But that “knowledge” is based mostly on conjecture and hearsay, and while...

VIENNA (Reuters) - Austrian right-wing populist Joerg Haider called President Bush a war criminal on Saturday, days before Austria's government hosts Bush and European leaders in Vienna. Haider, whose group is part of Austrian Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel's government coalition, said Bush's meeting with his European peers on Wednesday was pointless as he did not expect the U.S. president to pay attention to what Europe had to tell him. ``He is a war criminal. He brought about the war against Iraq deliberately, with lies and falsehoods,'' Haider said in an interview with Austrian daily newspaper Die Presse. ``The Iraqi population is...

The links between Nick Berg and Zacarias Moussaoui, once described as the 20th hijacker of 9/11, opened now room for new speculations, if there are deeper ties between the OKC Bombing'95 and 9/11, than thought before. Apparently Berg knew also Moussaoui's roomates. One of them was Mujahid Menepta, who is connected to both 1993 World Trade Center bombing and the 1995 OKC bombing. But Menepta wasn't arrested in Summer 2001, when Moussaoui got caught. The FBI waited until after Sep11th.Why?Berg, Moussaoui and the OK bombing tieshttp://inn.globalfreepress.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=269 By Ewing20012004/5/24 On May 18th, 2004, according to Newsmax, Nick Berg's family insisted that...

VIENNA, Austria (AP) - Joerg Haider's once-powerful Freedom Party - long associated with Austria's far right fringe - purged most rightists from senior positions Tuesday in an attempt to stem its descent from success to political oblivion. Haider, who is no longer the party head but remains its most influential figure, also announced that the party would be formally relaunched in an attempt to end a string of disastrous election showings. Ursula Haubner, the party head and Haider's sister, said the move to remove most rightists from positions of influence reflected the party's decision "to orient itself in new directions...

Controversial Rightist Wins Re-Election, Hopes to Regain National Prominence Mar 7, 2004 By George Jahn/ Associated Press Writer VIENNA, Austria (AP) - Joerg Haider brought his party a stunning victory in his home province Sunday, confounding pundits and increasing the odds for a national comeback for the rightist known for anti-Jewish slurs and friendship with Saddam Hussein. With Haider's Freedom Party polling more than 10 percentage points behind the Socialists just weeks before legislative elections in Carinthia province. Most predicted a Freedom Party loss after a string of defeats elsewhere over the past two years. While the voting was restricted...

Jubilant Haider looks for return to power of the far Right By Michael Leidig in Vienna (Filed: 08/03/2004) Austria's far-Right nationalist Jörg Haider's Freedom Party looked set to grasp a surprise victory in an election in the Alpine province of Carinthia, according to early returns yesterday. Polls had predicted that Haider might lose his power base but a partial count reported on Austrian state television, based on more than a quarter of votes cast, showed that Mr Haider's party had won 43 per cent of the vote to the Socialist Party's 38 per cent. Jörg Haider looks set to retain...

VIENNA, Austria (AP) -- Joerg Haider brought his party a stunning victory in his home province Sunday, confounding pundits and increasing the odds for a national comeback for the rightist known for anti-Jewish slurs and friendship with Saddam Hussein. With Haider's Freedom Party polling more than 10 percentage points behind the Socialists just weeks before legislative elections in Carinthia province. Most predicted a Freedom Party loss after a string of defeats elsewhere over the past two years. While the voting was restricted to Carinthia, its significance extended beyond Austria's southernmost province. Beyond assuring his reappointment as governor, the win increased...

Far-right Austrian politician Joerg Haider is to battle for his political future in elections in the southern province of Carinthia on Sunday. Latest opinion polls show his Freedom Party running neck-and-neck with the Social Democrats. Four years ago, Mr Haider sent shock waves throughout Europe when he led his party into a national coalition government with the conservatives. But now he is struggling to retain his job as governor of Carinthia province. Revenge fears Support for the Freedom Party has slumped nationwide, and recent polls in Carinthia say the party is now trailing a few points behind the Social Democrats....

Haider maintains its comparison between George W Bush and Saddam Hussein The strong Joerg Haider, Austrian line man extreme, maintained Friday his comparison between Saddam Hussein and the American president George W Bush, by referring to Adolf Hitler indirectly. Mr. Haider had declared on December 16 that it was "difficult for him to choose between Bush and Saddam": "both scorned the international law, both undermined the humans right. But first A behind him power of the United States while second was a weak dictator ". Joerg Haider stressed that it maintained its remarks, which "were well formulated", by receiving...

Vienna, Dec 17 - US troops may have arrested a double of Saddam Hussein and DNA testing does not prove conclusively that they have captured the Iraqi dictator, Austrian Freedom Party ex-leader Joerg Haider said late Tuesday. Calling the capture "slapstick" and a "real scam", Haider told national ORF television: "This may be one of his many doubles." "The saliva tests they did mean nothing if they did not have earlier specimens to which they could compare it," the former leader of Austria's far-right Freedom Party added. Haider visited Saddam in Baghdad in February 2002 and caused a stir on...

<p>THAL, Austria &#8212; Austrians yesterday cheered native son Arnold Schwarzenegger who left as a young bodybuilder in 1968 and won the governor's office in his new home, California.</p> <p>"I was moved to tears," said Elfi Kling, who runs a restaurant in Mr. Schwarzenegger's hometown of Thal.</p>

Initial results from Austria's general election suggest the centre-right People's Party of Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel is making sweeping gains. Result predictions (1999 results in brackets) People's Party: 42.3% (26%) Social Democrats: 36.9% (33%) Freedom Party: 10.2% (26.9%) Greens: 9.0% (7.4) But Austria's other outgoing coalition partner, Joerg Haider's far-right Freedom Party, has been stripped of nearly two-thirds of its previous support. The People's Party looks likely to take nearly 43% of the vote, according to preliminary results released by the interior ministry. If the estimates prove correct, it will be the best ever result for the party, and put it...

VIENNA -- Austria's prominent far-right politician Joerg Haider attacked U.S. foreign policy on Monday, accusing President George Bush of using the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington as a pretext for attacking anyone he designated as an enemy, AFP reported. "September 11 is not a license to bomb everyone in the world that the American chief policeman George Bush has pronounced guilty," Haider told reporters. He said U.S. foreign policy had "failed". The controversial far-righter rapped Washington for rejecting the UN treaty setting up the International Criminal Court (ICC), saying it was not playing by international rules. "That...

Austrian populist Jörg Haider's plans to build a right-wing pan- European club could attract some surprising supporters, says Kate Connolly Just as Austria's Jörg Haider thought his star was being overshadowed by the recent success of other far-right politicians in Europe, he has cunningly come up with a plan that could eclipse them all. The success of Jean-Marie Le Pen's National Front in France's elections prompted the far-rightist to unveil his plans to establish a pan-European anti-Europe platform. Several European elections later, his ideas have developed considerably. In a recent interview with Italy's conservative daily Corriere della Sera, he announced...

On September 28, 2000, the European Council, "acting in accordance with the procedure referred to in Article 251 Establishing the European Community," adopted "Common Position (EC) No. 50/2000. "According to Notice No. 2000/C 370/01 of the Official Journal of the European Communities, the Common Position concerned "special provisions for vehicles used for the carriage of passengers comprising more than eight seats in addition to the driver's seat." In other words, the council - the key decision-making organ of the European Union - passed the so-called bus directive. For anyone seriously interested in understanding how the EU functions, leafing through the...

To Ground Zero, or next to it, to meet Jorg Haider, the governor of Carinthia and head of the Freedom Party of Austria. There are not many politicians quite like Haider around, certainly not in Europe, where they tend to run to fat, bald, ugly and definitely hypocritical. Haider is trim, athletic, with a full head of hair, suntanned and good-looking, just like the Austrians one sees in ski movies. He also speaks his mind. I particularly liked his aides, young Austrian men with very good manners and none of that "Who the hell are you?" look so many gofers...

The recent controversial visit to Iraq by the Austrian politician Yorg Haider was intended to win commercial transactions worth billions of Euros for various Austrian companies including one situated in the state of Carinthia and owned by Haider, a weekly Austrian magazine disclosed, according to KUNA. Format, in a Saturday publication said Haider had recently conveyed a message to the Iraqi foreign minister, Naji al-Sabri, reminding him of the "Baghdad deal with the ministry of commerce." Format published excerpts of the message, in which Haider expressed the expertise of the Austrian companies, especially highlighting a large project aimed at linking...