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President Heinz Fischer (AP)
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| April 11, 2006 |
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President Heinz Fischer criticized Austria's postwar declaration of independence for representing his country as a victim of the Nazis instead of a participant in the atrocities of that era.
Fischer, in an interview with the daily Der Standard, said the 1955 Declaration of Independence presented a false picture of the country.
The declaration re-established Austria's sovereignty after 17 years as part of Nazi Germany and then under the control of the Soviet Union and the three Western Allies.
It represents "the war fomented by Hitler as one that no Austrian could have predicted or wanted back then," said Fischer. "And that is not correct. Many, many people knew that Hitler meant war ... and after Hitler's initial war successes in 1939 and 1940, many Austrians enthusiastically backed the triumphs of the Hitler army."
Fischer also complained that the document has "not one word about the Jewish victims, about those who died in the concentration camps, who had to leave the country, who were the victims of Nazi justice."
"A part of reality is missing here," he said.
Vienna was home to a vibrant Jewish community of some 200,000 before World War II. Today, it numbers about 7,000.
Austrian leaders first began questioning the official view - that the 1938 annexation of Austria represented an act of aggression by Nazi Germany - back in the 1980s. Since then, the country has made great strides in coming to terms with the era and has sought to make amends by launching several restitution programs that have paid out hundreds of millions of euros (dollars) in claims or property.
The most costly single settlement involved the recent return of five paintings by Austrian art icon Gustav Klimt to a California woman representing heirs of a Jewish businessman who originally owned the works.
Still, Fischer's comments were unusually direct in specifically criticizing a key Austrian historical document for omissions that amounted to misrepresenting his country's relation to the Nazi era.
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