VIENNA: For many Austrians, the victory over the Ottoman Turks by troops of the Austro-Hungarian empire at the gates of Vienna in 1683 is regarded as a badge of honour.
But analysts say history does not explain why opinion polls show around 80 per cent of Austrians oppose Turkey joining the European Union and why Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel resisted the start of Turkish entry talks for so long.
Rather than a military advance, Austrians cite the fear of an invasion of Turkish workers flooding the Austrian jobs market and mass immigration in general.
“What do we need Turkey for? It is an Asian country or almost an Asian country ... We have enough problems with all the others (new EU member states),” a man who asked only to be identified as Norbert, 60, said at the Viktor Adler market in a working-class area of Vienna.
But cultural differences are just part of the equation.
“There is a sense among many people in Austria of a threat that is partly cultural, a fear of loss of jobs, scepticism towards Islam and mainly scepticism about the unknown,” Christoph Hofinger of the Institute of Social Research and Analysis said.
This fear of the unknown has been stoked by the broad opposition to Turkish membership by the country’s political parties, including Schuessel’s coalition government.
The chancellor had insisted at EU talks in Luxembourg that the huge, poor country be offered an alternative to full membership of the bloc but finally accepted the draft negotiating mandate with Turkey, EU diplomats said.
The resistance would have played well back in Austria, where Schuessel’s centre-right government is losing popularity and faces a general election in the next 12 months.
A measure of the decline in support for Schuessel’s conservative People’s Party came on Sunday when it lost control of the southern province of Styria which it has held since 1945.
The victors were the opposition Social Democrats, who have supported Vienna’s tough stance against Turkey’s EU membership.
Some diplomats and media commentators believe Schuessel also took a hard line in the hope of winning votes, possibly from the far right, which is divided after populist Joerg Haider split from his Freedom Party to create a new group.
Public hostility has been fed by the opposition to Turkish EU membership from top-selling daily, Kronen Zeitung, read by roughly a third of Austrians, analysts say.
With unemployment around 5 per cent, Austrians have less reason to fear for their jobs than many other Europeans, but Austria’s proximity to Balkan states which also want to join the EU stirs more concern.
“Immigration has to stop because there are not enough jobs. People from Romania and Bulgaria are already coming in and if Turkey joins, that will be even more ... We don’t want to have less for them to have more,” said retired tram driver Franz Brauschick, 59.
While many Austrians enjoy holidays on Turkish beaches they are less keen to forge closer links with the country.
“They know very little about Turkey,” Hofinger said.
Austria’s 116,882 Turks are the second biggest group of immigrants in the Alpine country after Serbs and Montenegrins, according to official statistics from the start of this year.
Yet public opinion in mainly Catholic Austria seems far more concerned about Turkey joining the EU than it is about nearby Balkan states.
Schuessel supports the membership bid by Catholic Croatia — once part of the sprawling Austro-Hungarian empire.
