Austrian conservatives are now open to negotiating and forming a government with the extreme right

The new Austrian conservative leader, Christian stockerhas assured that his party would be willing to participate in the talks with the far-right party to form a government and that they would take these talks “seriously,” according to Reuters.

The country’s president, Alexander Van der Bellen, announced this Sunday that he will meet with the leader of the far-right party (FPÖ), Herbert Kicklto explore alternatives for the election of the new executive. All this, after the attempts to form a Government without this party – winner of the elections – failed and caused Nehammer’s resignation this Saturday.

Stocker has been elected by the Austrian Popular Party as the new acting president of the formation after the resignation of Nehammer. «I hope that the leader of the party with the most votes will have the task of forming a future government [refiérdonse a Kickl]. If we are invited to these (coalition) talks, we will accept this invitation», Stocker said in statements collected by Reuters after being elected. Likewise, the new conservative leader has expressed that “the country needs a stable government now.”

Negotiations until this Saturday were ongoing between the ÖVP (conservative party) and the Austrian Social Democratic Party (SPÖ). The liberal party, which ended up withdrawing from the table, was also part of those conversations. Conservatives and social democrats they have blamed each other that the negotiations to form an Executive leaving out the extreme right have failed.

For his part, Kickl has regretted the “lost three months” of negotiations for the formation of a Government: “Instead of stability, we have chaos,” he said in a statement reported by EFE.

If these negotiations finally take place between the conservatives and the extreme right, it would not be the first time they govern together. ÖVP and FPÖ They did it between 2017 and 2019; Furthermore, they do so in five of the nine states. However, now the FPÖ would be the strong partner.