Austria’s language strife

Press, 16 September 1976, Page 20

Austria’s language strife

By

FREDERICK SCHEU

in Vienna

Austrians usually consider themselves good internationalists and they have been genuinely surprised at being branded as “neoNazis” and accused of “genocide” at mass meetings in Yugoslavia in recent weeks.

Behind the Yugoslav campaign is the problem of the Slovenian minority in Austria’s southern province, Carinthia and a major row between them and German speaking nationalists. The Slovenes’ mother country is part of neighbouring Yugoslavia. The dispute would never have reached it< present heat if Austria’s ’ Socialist Government, under Chancel-, lor Bruno Kreisky, had been content to let sleeping dogs lie. Instead, it tried to improve the position of the Slovenian minority in accordance with Austria’s obligations under the Austrian Peace Treaty of 1955. Anything between 25,000 and 80,000 of Carinthia’s 500,000 inhabitants speak Slovene as their mother tongue. The actual number is in dispute. The Slovenes have their own political organisations (partly Roman Catholic, partly Tito-Com-munist), their clubs and societies, and schools including an excellent Slovene high school at Klagenfurt, the Carinthian capital. Austria has fulfilled most of its obligations with one significant exception: the place names and sign-posts in the villages where part of the population is Slovenespeaking are still in German instead of being bilingual. Three years ago the Governor of Carinthia, Mr Hans Sima, a Socialist, following instructions from Chancellor Kreisky in Vienna, had bilingual sign-posts and place names put up in all villages assumed to have a sizable Slovene-speaking population. The mistake of the Socialists was that they did not reach ■n agreement in advance on this pant with the opposition parties in the Austrian ParHitment

The following night all the bilingual place names and sign-posts were torn down by German nationalist mobs, with the police looking on. They were never restored. Governor Sima resigned and was replaced by another Socialist, Mr Leopold Wagner, who introduced himself by saying that he had been a “fairly enthusiastic” Nazi youth as a boy. The Austrian Parliamentary parties have now, after lengthy negotiations, agreed that new bilingual signs are to be put up, but only after a census has shown how many Slovenes there are in each village. But the Slovenes refuse to be counted

There is no doubt that the number of Slovenian-speak-ing people in Carinthia has gradually declined, mainly through assimiliation. In 1920, after the First World War, a plebiscite was held in Southern Carinthia to decide whether the area should remain Austrian or join the newly-formed Yugoslav State. The majority voted for Austria, although at that time most of the voters in the plebiscite area were Slo-vene-speaking. One reason was that Austria at that time was disarmed and had no compulsory military service while Yugoslavia had. Another reason was that the people still felt attached to Vienna rather than far-away Belgrade. Thus. Southern Carinthia was saved for Austria by Slovene votes. The Yugoslav troops which had entered the area had to withdraw.

After the Second World War, Tito’s partisans entered Southern Carinthia, but the Yugoslavs had to withdraw again, this time under pressure’ from the British occupation authorities in Austria.

The Austrian Government has decided to hold a census in November asking each citizen to declare his mother tongue,. To spare Slovene feelings it will be held all over Austria (not only in

Carinthia). The census will be secret in form like a general election. Nobody will be compelled to take part. The results are merely to serve as a “guidance” for future decisions as to which places should have bilingual signposts. The percentage of a minority group which will be considered necessary for bilingual signs (perhaps 25 per cent) is left open.

The Slovenes, however, are recommending - their people to boycott the census. They, say that the results will not remain secret and that people may be victimised for declaring themselves as Slovenes. The Slovenes are not the only Yugoslav minority in Austria. Many villages in the eastern province, Burgenland, are Croat-speaking. The Croats are on excellent terms with their German and Hungarian-speaking neighbours. Their national costumes and folk-dancing groups are considered an asset to the province. But the Burgenland Croats are d> scended from people who fled from the Turks centuries ago and they have neither a common frontier

with Yugoslavia nor political connections with Croatia.

The quarrel between Ger-man-speaking Carinthians, particularly those affiliated with German nationalist organisations, on the one side and Slovenes on the other has now grown more bitter. Groups of former “defence fighters for Carinthia,” among whom Nazi influence may be strong, have held ceremonies to put up monuments to defence fighters of 1918. Slovene counter-demon-strators were arrested and allegedly manhandled by the Austrian police. The Yugosla” Ambassador to Austria has distributed medals to Austrian Slovenes who fought in the ranks of Tito’s partisans. Communists and other Left-wing circles in Carinthia demonstrate their solidarity with the Slovenes.

The Austrian Government is now considering banning all political demonstrations in Carinthia, at least until the census has been taken. It hopes that feelings may calm down again without presenting Europe with another crisis area.

(O.F.N.S. Copyright.)