Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz addressed the country’s parliament for the first time since taking office in front of the coalition of his conservative Austrian People’s Party, which formed a coalition with the far-right Austrian Freedom Party, promising to keep the country on a pro-EU course and “European values” as a standard. The Chancellor’s pledge includes fighting anti-Semitism, addressing an outrage in Israel over the alliance with the FPO, a party founded by former Nazis in the 1950s. Israel reacted to the inauguration of the conservative-rightist cabinet by saying it would do business only with the “operational echelons” of government departments headed by an FPO minister, which includes the Austrian foreign, interior and defense ministries.
