Schuessel loses regional vote

Austrian Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel's party lost yesterday a regional vote seen as linked to his tough stance against Turkey becoming a member of the European Union.

Provisional election results yesterday showed the Social Democrats won control of the southern province of Styria, a stronghold of Mr Schuessel's People's Party since 1945.

Diplomats and media commentators have said Mr Schuessel tried to gain support with his stance on Turkey after rising unemployment and unpopular cuts in Austria's generous welfare state damaged support for his government.

Austria is alone in the European Union in opposing the terms for launching entry talks with Turkey today and is demanding a clear alternative to full membership. Opinion polls suggest 80 per cent of Austrians oppose Turkey joining the bloc.

Diplomats, however, have said they hoped Vienna would drop its opposition after polls closed at 1400 GMT in Styria. EU foreign ministers had to agree a negotiating mandate in an emergency meeting in Luxembourg last night.

Results shown by Austrian broadcaster ORF said Mr Schuessel's Conservatives had won 38.7 per cent of the vote, a fall of 8.6 percentage points from the previous vote, behind the Social Democrats at 41.7 per cent, who gained 9.4 percentage points.

"I am struggling to believe it because historically it is an unbelievable result after... 60 years," Styrian Social Democrat frontrunner Franz Voves told ORF.

The Communist Party would join the regional parliament for the first time in 35 years with 6.3 per cent of the vote, ORF said, filling a void left by the break-up of Joerg Haider's far-right Freedom Party.

The election in Styria and polls later this month in the eastern province of Burgenland and in Vienna are the first votes since Mr Haider broke away from the Freedom Party and founded his own Alliance for the Future of Austria.

Styria, the home province of California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, is one of nine Austrian provinces.

The Freedom Party failed to enter the regional assembly, winning 4.6 per cent of the vote, while Mr Haider's new party only managed 1.7 per cent, ORF said.

Despite the setback for Mr Schuessel's party, which lost the western province of Salzburg to the Social Democrats last year, Peter Hajek of pollster OGM said the chancellor was unlikely to call an early national vote due to his coalition's unpopularity.

"The People's Party and the Alliance for the Future of Austria have no option other than to keep working," he said.

He said Mr Schuessel's stance on Turkey was part of a long-term strategy ahead of Austria assuming the EU presidency at the start of next year and a parliamentary election.

"Schuessel is concerned with the EU presidency and the parliamentary election in 2006," Mr Hajek said. "He is condemned to come home (from Luxembourg) with a success."