The speaker of the lower house of the Austrian parliament and politician of the far-right FPOe party, Walter Rosenkranz, is criticized for inviting Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban. During the September meeting, the Austrian delegation included only deputies from his party. After a parliamentary interpellation, it turned out that he had lied about organizing the visit of the Hungarian Prime Minister.
The criticism relates to the way Orban's September visit to Vienna was organized and conducted. Prime minister Hungarian was the first foreign guest of the new Austrian parliament. He came at the invitation of Walter Rosenkranz. He serves as the chairman of the National Council, the lower house of parliament, and comes from the far-right Freedom Party Austria (FPOe).
The most doubtful thing was the fact that during the meeting with the head of the Hungarian government, the Austrian delegation included only deputies from Rosenkranz's party. Immediately after the event, the FPOe politician repeatedly assured that no one informed him that ignoring deputies from other parties was inappropriate and that since Orban was a guest of parliament, representatives of all parliamentary groups should take part in the talks.
Immediately after the visit, interpellations on this matter were submitted by the peasants from OeVP and the liberals from NEOS. On Friday, Austrian state television Oe1 also transmitted the content of a report by the parliament's protocol office, which assured that Rosenkranz had been informed in advance by the competent diplomatic service about the “usual composition” of such meetings. Officials clearly confirmed that he was aware that representatives of all parties should participate in such events.
Walter Rosenkranz, chairman of the lower house of the Austrian parliament and politician of the FPOe partyPAP/EPA
The initiative was to come from Hungary
After the report was published by Oe1 television, Rosenkranz himself commented on the matter. In the Morgenjournal program, also on Oe1, the president stated: – The parliamentary management has informed my office about the usual composition of Austrian delegations at international meetings. Nevertheless, I decided on a delegation consisting of FPOe mandates.
Rosenkranz added that the initiative to narrow the Austrian delegation to deputies from the ranks of right-wing Austrian libertarians came from the Hungarians.
The criticism of the September meeting between Rosenkranz and Orban does not only concern the composition of the host delegation. For souvenir photos, both politicians posed against only the Austrian and Hungarian flags, while according to officials, according to the protocol, the European Union flag should also be included. In this case, Rozenkranz explains that the head of the Hungarian government was not visiting as the president of the Council of the European Union (at that time, Hungary held the presidency of the EU Council), which is why it was decided to choose the flags in this way. According to Rosenkranz, this was to help avoid possible misunderstandings.
Viktor Orban (left) and Walter Rosenkranz (right) pose for a photo in front of the Hungarian and Austrian flagsPAP/EPA
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Main photo source: PAP/EPA