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Austria vice chancellor quits over video sting that threatens govt

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VIENNA: Austria’s vice chancellor and longtime far-right leader, Heinz-Christian Strache, said on Saturday he was stepping down over “catastrophic” video footage of him that threatened to bring down the right-wing coalition government.


Freedom Party (FPO) leader Strache was shown in the footage of as-yet unknown origin meeting a woman posing as the niece of a Russian oligarch in 2017, shortly before the election that brought him to power.


In the footage published by German media on Friday evening, a week before European Parliament elections, he appears to offer to funnel contracts towards a company in exchange for political and financial support.


“It was dumb, it was irresponsible and it was a mistake,” Strache told a news conference, fighting back tears as he asked his wife and others to forgive him.


He maintained, however, that he had done nothing illegal and that it was a “targeted political assassination”.


“In the cold light of day, my remarks were catastrophic and exceedingly embarrassing,” he said about the video, in which he also referred to party financing rules and how to work around them, but also insisted on having to act legally.


Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz is expected to make a statement later as speculation swirled about whether the damage would be limited to Strache or if Kurz would call a snap election only 18 months after the coalition between his conservatives and the FPO was formed.


Kurz has repeatedly distanced himself from the FPO over lesser scandals, mostly ones involving party officials and anti-Semitism or racism, to protect his popularity. It was unclear how far the damage from the tape would spread.


“This is the tip of the iceberg,” Thomas Drozda, from the opposition Social Democrats, told national broadcaster ORF.


“I expect the chancellor, who evidently has known about this video for 48 hours, and that his coalition partner is drowning in a swamp of corruption, to speak and explain his position. He has been hiding for 48 hours ... he owes the country an explanation.”


Kurz has not given a time for his statement.


Strache said he would be replaced by Transport Minister Norbert Hofer, his deputy within the party who narrowly lost 2016’s presidential election and is more popular than the sometimes aggressive and abrasive Strache. — Reuters


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