Jörg Haider
 Jörg Haider    (politician) | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | 26 January 1950 |
| Died | 11 October 2008 (Age 58) |
| Nationality | Austrian |
Jörg Haider was an Austrian right wing politician with many mighty enemies, who died under suspicious circumstances. He was Governor of the province of Carinthia on two occasions, the long-time leader of the right wing populist Austrian Freedom Party (FPÖ) and later Chairman of the Alliance for the Future of Austria (BZÖ), a breakaway party from the FPÖ.
Contents
Career
In 1970 Haider became the leader of the FPÖ youth movement and headed it until 1974. He became party chairman in 1986.Under Haider's leadership, the FPÖ moved to the right, reflecting Haider's nationalist, anti-immigration, and anti-EU views, with an independent, neutralist foreign policy. This caused no end to comparisons to Hitler, especially in the NATO-press, no matter how farfetched these comparisons in reality were. From 1986 when Haider became the FPÖ's chairman the party's share in elections rose from 5% in the 1983 elections to almost 27% in 1999.
In 2000, Haider's Freedom Party unexpectedly became second after the Social Democrats (SPÖ) in the 1999 parliamentary elections. After efforts by the runner-up, the mainstream right wing ÖVP, to renew its coalition with the Social Democrats failed, the ÖVP reached an agreement with the FPÖ. Normally, Haider should have become chancellor. Deemed too controversial to be part of the government, let alone head it, he stepped aside in favor of ÖVP leader Wolfgang Schüssel.
The coalition caused widespread outrage both in Austria and the rest of Europe. The heads of government of the other fourteen EU members decided to cease cooperation with the Austrian government, as it was felt in many countries that the cordon sanitaire against coalitions with parties considered as right-wing extremists, which had mostly held in Western Europe since 1945, had been breached. For several months, other national leaders shunned diplomatic contacts with members of the Schüssel government.
At the end of February 2000, Haider stepped down from the leadership of the Freedom Party. This was widely regarded as a cynical move to appease foreign criticism, as he appeared to continue to control the party from behind the scenes, with his successor, Vice-Chancellor Susanne Riess-Passer, being only pro-forma in charge.
After heavy external pressure, the FPÖ, whose chair was Haider's sister, Ursula Haubner, was riven with internal strife. On 4 April 2005, Haider, Haubner, Vice Chancellor Hubert Gorbach and other leading figures of the FPÖ announced the creation of a new party called Alliance for the Future of Austria (BZÖ) with Haider as leader. In effect, this split the FPÖ into two parties.
In the 2006 general elections, the BZÖ received 4.1% of votes, thus narrowly securing its representation of 7 seats in parliament. The FPÖ, now led by Heinz-Christian Strache surpassed initial expectations, receiving 11.0% of the vote.
Smear job by Intelligence Services
Haider visited Iraq to meet Saddam Hussein twice, one time on the eve of the attack on Iraq in 2003, as well as having had a friendship with Muammar Gaddafi when Libya was very hated in Western capitals.
In 2010, the Austrian magazine Profil (journalist: Michael Nikbakhsh) tried a smear job on Haider and party colleague Ewald Stadler, bearing all the hallmarks of having been spoon fed to the media by Western intelligence services via their puppet Iraqi government.
The magazine received a dossier written as part of an 2008 investigation "from the Iraqi Ministry of the Interior - both in Arabic and in the English version of a translation agency based in Damascus, Syria. It is a note from the Department of Internal Affairs and Security dated May 22, 2008, marked Top Secret"...."The investigation proved that the two gentlemen had received the amount of five million US Dollars from Saddam Hussein against their services to him. Stadler received three million seven hundred and fifty thousand US Dollars, and Dr. Jörg Haider received the rest, which is one million two hundred and fifty thousand US dollars."[1]
The same article also reported from anonymous sources in Haider's entrourage, "that Libya's head of state Muammar al-Gaddafi - Haider visited him three times in any case - is said to have several times sent 150,000 to 200,000 dollars cash, 'firmly sealed in plastic', to Austria."
Similar stories were reported in the English speaking press, upping the figure to a whopping "$58.7m transfer from Gaddafi, as well as more than $13.3m that unidentified individuals brought home from Iraq."[2]
Suspicious Death
Official Story=
Haider died of injuries from a car crash at Lambichl near Klagenfurt, in his home state of Carinthia, in the early hours of 11 October 2008. Police reported that the Volkswagen Phaeton that Haider had been driving came off the road, rolled down an embankment, and overturned, causing "severe head and chest injuries".
An initial investigation uncovered no signs of foul play, and conspiracy theories about the death have been strongly rejected by the Austrian police. Haider's blood alcohol level at the time of the crash was 1.8 mg/l, more than three times the legal limit of 0.5 mg/l.
Inconsistencies in official story
Inconsistencies appeared immediately after the accident:[3]
- The car was completely destroyed at a far too small accident site.
- Extreme injuries in an extremely safe luxury limousine. Why did the politician have “no chance of survival” in one of the safest automobiles on the market?
- An otherwise always sober professional politician in a drinking frenzy speeding at the wheel.
- The “only witness” to the accident went underground and is still hiding from investigators.
- Haider had alcohol in the blood but not in the stomach.
- Why was the body embalmed immediately after the autopsy and why?
- Photos of the wreck and site were manipulated photos, witnesses went suddenly silent and there were a wealth of contradicting statements.
- Haider was a very hated man in many quarters, including foreign capitals, and intelligence services had already tried (and failed) to character assassinate him with media smears job.
Related Document
| Title | Type | Publication date | Author(s) | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| File:Haider-leaflet.pdf | leaflet | A summary of inconsistent facts surrounding the crash. |
