A busy international news day, this October 4, 1999 starting with all eyes on Austria.
Austria’s anti-immigrant Freedom Party staked a claim to a role in the next government after preliminary election results showed it had placed second behind the governing Social Democrats. Chancellor Viktor Klima’s Social Democrats suffered their worst showing since World War II but still placed first with about 33 percent of the vote. The conservative People’s Party, their governing partner for the past 13 years, fell to third place with 27 percent. While the conservatives vowed to wait until the last votes were counted, the Freedom Party celebrated what leader Jorg Haider described as a “sensational breakthrough” when early returns showed they had gained more than 5 percent to surge past the People’s Party. The dramatic gains by the Freedom Party, whose nationalistic appeals and xenophobic policies have stirred comparisons to the Nazis and other fascist movements, represented the biggest breakthrough by a far-right political grouping in Western Europe since the war.
The results left Austria’s 8 million citizens uncertain about the shape of their next government. Klima has vowed never to form a coalition with Haider’s group, which he has described as a repugnant political force driven by hateful ideology.
Meanwhile – A physician dubbed “Dr. Death” by the media went on trial this day, when prosecutors start impeding layers of mad chemistry, killings, drug dealing and fraud surrounding the apartheid era’s chemical and biological warfare program Dr. Wouter Basson, a heart surgeon who continues in private practice, faces charges that he killed 16 people, supplied poison to kill 200 and defrauded the white minority government of more than $13 million. Details of Basson’s secret program began emerging in 1992. Other governments including the United States, Britain and Switzerland apparently knew about the program.
And finally; Politicians and business executives mourned the death of Sony Corp. co-founder Akio Morita on Sunday, lauding the entrepreneur who helped change Japan’s image from a maker of slipshod products to worldclass manufacturer. “Morita was a leading figure who played a pivotal role in developing Japan’s postwar economy,” Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi was quoted as saying by Kyodo News agency. Morita, whose health had been failing for several years, died Sunday of pneumonia. He was 78.
Obuchi was one of about 400 people who visited the world renowned businessman’s Tokyo home following his death. Morita co-founded the electronics giant in a bombed-out department store after World War II. He was the last of a generation of Japanese industrialists that included carmaker Soichiro Honda and electronics rival Konosuke Matsushita.
And along with events unfolding in Austria, that’s just a sample of what happened this October 4th in 1999 as reported by The BBC World Service And PRI.
