Terrorist attack in Vienna: Austria commemorates the victims
ÖAustria held several events on Tuesday to commemorate the victims of the terrorist attack in downtown Vienna a year ago. The heads of the republics met in the late afternoon in the Ruprechtkirche. It is located in the neighborhood in which an Islamist terrorist killed four people and injured more than 20, some seriously, with an assault rifle and a pistol on November 2, 2020. Federal President Alexander Van der Bellen remembered the victims of the “cowardly terrorist attack”, but also remembered many people who “weighed in” their lives and health in order to protect others. “We try together to heal the wounds.”
The top government and leading politicians from all parliamentary parties also participated, with the exception of FPÖ boss Herbert Kickl, who, it was said, was prevented. The City of Vienna had previously held a memorial with Mayor Michael Ludwig (SPÖ). Federal Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg (ÖVP) expressed “our deeply felt condolences” to the injured victims and the bereaved of the dead. But as inhuman the deed was, so human help and solidarity were at this point in time.
Representatives from religious communities were also represented. The Archbishop of Vienna, Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, also recalled the victims of the Holocaust who were “driven to death with a comparable ideology”. He wanted: “How do such attitudes come about?”
At the same time, the opposition parties severely criticized the “turquoise-green” government. The SPÖ spoke of “flight of responsibility” because the security authorities were being relegated to officials under the responsibility of the ÖVP, and of “lack of empathy” because they had not apologized to the victims “and the whole population”. The FPÖ chairman Kickl, formerly Minister of the Interior himself, called for the resignation of the incumbent Karl Nehammer (ÖVP), who was responsible for “several breakdowns in advance”. The Chancellor, Vice Chancellor and Minister of the Interior wanted to honor forces in a police barracks that evening, who had a successful war, involved the perpetrator in several exchanges of fire and killed nine minutes after the first emergency call.