The relationship was not always tension-free. In 2018, the then Minister of Foreign Affairs Karin Kneissl in their deep obeisances Vladimir Putin sunk, Kurz himself rushed to Kiev to calm the angry spirits. Pro-Western Ukrainian politicians loudly protested Austria’s flirtation with Putin. “Reconciliation trip to the Knicks before Putin” was the title of the KURIER report on the short trip at the time. Kurz assured the Ukrainians that Austria would not relinquish its neutral role in favor of Russia.
The trip had apparently worked. A year later – the ÖVP surprisingly had to go to new elections because of “Ibiza” – Klitschko willingly came to Vienna as an election official and posed at the opening event of the Political Academy. The secretary general of the ÖVP at the time was a certain Karl Nehammer.
Contacts via European party families
As chancellor, Nehammer immediately and clearly sided with Ukraine in the war of Russian aggression. Austria is “militarily neutral”, but clearly in its position on the side of democracy and European values. Zelensky called Nehammer on February 24, the day the war broke out, and said, “I don’t know how long my country will exist and I don’t know how long I will live.”
In Austria, only the Neos are even more committed than Nehammer to the Ukrainian cause. Selensky’s “Servants of the People” party is associated with the liberal EU ALDE party family.
Kiev information
In the final weeks of the war, the Chancellery received repeated phone calls from Kiev. The Ukrainians asked for humanitarian aid, helmets and protective vests. Austria delivered, if possible. “Ukrainians know our history, they know our neutrality, and therefore they do not ask for military support, which we cannot give them,” the statement at Ballhausplatz said.