The far right is the protagonist of the protests in Austria against the confinement by the coronavirus

The Austrian far right today starred in the protests against mandatory vaccination and the confinement of the entire population dictated by the government of the Federal Chancellor, Alexander Schallenberg, to stop the coronavirus epidemic. Demonstrations that led to clashes with the police in the center of Vienna, where officers detained more than 10 people. The police estimated the number of participants at 12,000 to 35,000 while the organizers spoke of up to 100,000 attendees, a greatly exaggerated number, according to local media. In any case, thousands of people attended the various calls, among others, the ultranationalist and Eurosceptic Austrian Liberal Party (FPOE) and the so-called Identitarian Movement, of neo-Nazi ideology. Among the attendees were notorious nostalgics of the Third Reich such as the Carinthian businessman Martin Rutter, who in his speech to the participants spoke of “our beautiful German people.”

“Control the borders – No to your people” read one of the large banners behind which one of the columns of protesters marching down the great avenue of the Ring shouting “resistance” and “we are the people.” The central and historic Heldenplatz in front of the Hofburg, the former imperial palace was one of the places of concentration of the participants in the protests. Groups of protesters wore yellow stars of David like the ones the Nazis forced Jews to wear, but with the inscription “Not vaccinated.” Deniers of the pandemic, followers of esoteric movements, members of religious sects and defenders of conspiracy theories mixed with known “hooligans” and violent neo-Nazis. Thus, various posters were seen with texts “He heals us and gives hope”, in reference to Jesus Christ, “My body – My decision”, “No to the coronation” or “Schallenberg = Mengele”, which equates the federal chancellor with the doctor Nazi who carried out cruel experiments on prisoners in the Auschwitz concentration camp.

The protests came a day after the Schallenberg executive and the governments of the nine Austrian federal states agreed to dictate from this Monday the confinement of the entire population of the country for a period of up to 20 days and the vaccination order of all citizens as of February 1. Those not vaccinated had already been ordered last Monday not to leave their homes except for emergency matters, but the authorities saw as the week progressed that the situation became so critical that drastic measures were necessary. The Alpine republic has an incidence of more than 1,000 infections per 100,000 inhabitants in a week, which has skyrocketed to 1,500 in some regions such as Salzburg and Upper Austria. This Saturday, 15,297 new infections were registered for a country of only 8 million inhabitants.

The arrests came on the avenue del Ring after a group of protesters threw green smoke bombs, as well as bottles and cobblestones at the officers. A police spokesman pointed out that several arrests were made for administrative crimes and resistance to authority. In addition, complaints were carried out for the violation of the measures to combat the epidemic, such as not wearing the mandatory mask to avoid contagion. The police had deployed some 13,000 officers, many of them reinforcement from other federal states. Right-wing extremist groups had called on social media to carry out riots during the protests. The leader of the FPOE, Herbert Kickl, in home quarantine after testing positive for the virus, could not attend the appointment, but his followers projected a video message highly applauded by the attendees in which he encouraged skeptics of the coronavirus and to fight against the “dictatorship ” of the government.

“It is completely unacceptable that in the course of a demonstration, organized and called by a party with parliamentary representation, police officers are attacked and crimes are committed that violate the measures” adopted to curb the coronavirus, said Federal Minister of the Interior, Karl Nehammer , in a statement and in reference to the FPOE. He also stressed that the use of stars of David such as those that the Nazis forced Jews to wear “is not only in very bad taste, but also minimizes the crimes of National Socialism and offends the millions of victims and relatives of the Nazi dictatorship.” .