With the first charges against former constitutional protection officer Egisto Ott and former FPÖ politician Hans-Jörg Jenewein, ÖVP representative Andreas Hanger saw on Thursday “proven” that FPÖ leader Herbert Kickl “is an absolute security risk for Austria”. FPÖ General Secretary Christian Hafenecker rejected the accusations and spoke of “fairy tales”.
As was announced on Wednesday, the Vienna public prosecutor’s office has brought a first indictment against Ott on suspicion of abuse of office. Ott is accused of having commissioned another official, as an official of the Ministry of the Interior, to obtain information on participants in a meeting of European intelligence and secret services on behalf of Jenewein, who is also accused. Jenewein is also accused of having passed on confidential documents that became available to him as a politician and employee of the U-Committee in June 2021 and of having taken photos of informants and sent them to third parties. Ott is also accused of having passed on names of employees of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution to Jenewein as a police officer and of having asked a police officer to collect the names of the officers investigating the “Ibiza” case.
“Very close connection”
ÖVP representative Hanger told APA on Thursday that he was convinced that there was a “very close connection” between the alleged Russian spy Ott and Jenewein and the FPÖ. It was “unrealistic” that Kickl was not involved or informed about the flow of information between Ott and Jenewein. For example, as Interior Minister, Kickl had assigned Ott a central role in the reorganization of the secret service after the raid on the BVT. As Interior Minister, Kickl “destroyed the Austrian secret service,” Hanger confirmed. The only question is whether he did this out of “incompetence,” “or did he deliberately betray Austria’s security interests to Russia?” The security authorities were only able to prevent a terrorist attack on a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna because the intelligence services were warned by international services – if they had been cut off from such information flows, as was the case under Interior Minister Kickl, “that could have had catastrophic consequences,” says Hanger.
The blue general secretary Hafenecker saw this as “the one hundred and forty-seventh sequel to Hanger’s fairy tale”. It was “admirable” how Hanger was able to “distort” reality again and again, Hafenecker countered in an APA interview. Not so long ago, it was the ÖVP that sought contact with Russia. For example, the Austrian-Russian Friendship Society was “in ÖVP hands”. Hafenecker also recalled a photo in which the former Wirecard board member Jan Marsalek, who was also involved in the espionage case, and the former Interior Minister and current President of the National Council Wolfgang Sobotka (ÖVP) were said to be seen at a meal in the Austrian embassy in Moscow in 2017. Furthermore, the ÖVP had been involved in the disclosure of files, and the FPÖ had already filed a complaint because Hanger had held documents from the Interior Ministry in front of the cameras that had not yet been presented to the investigative committee. Hafenecker once again identified a “deep state”.
