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Austrian President Klestil dies on eve of retiring
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-07-07 07:42
Austrian President Thomas Klestil, who helped restore the presidency's image
after a Nazi-era controversy that dogged his predecessor, died late on Tuesday
aged 71 on the eve of his departure from office.
"He died today at 11:33
p.m. (1833 EDT)," said a spokeswoman for Vienna General Hospital, where Klestil
had been in intensive care since a heart attack on Monday.
Austria
President Thomas Klestil died on July 6, 2004 at the age of 71 following
heart failure, Austrian state television and the national news agency
said. Klestil is seen the imperial Hofburg palace in this April 9 file
photo. [Reuters]
| Doctors had said earlier on Tuesday they could do nothing but hope and pray
for Klestil's survival after his heart twice stopped beating, triggering
multiple organ failure.
Klestil, who has had a history of lung problems, was under sedation and on
artificial respiration. He was due to step down on Thursday after two six-year
terms and hand over the largely ceremonial presidency to Social Democrat Heinz
Fischer.
Klestil won the respect, if not the affection, of Austrians for repairing
much of the damage to the country's international image caused by revelations
about former president and U.N. Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim's role in the
German army under Adolf Hitler's Third Reich.
Austria President
Thomas Klestil died July 6, 2004 at the age of 71 following heart failure,
Austrian state television and the national news agency said. Austrian
President Thomas Klestil waves as he stands next to his wife Margot at the
opening of the Salzburg festival in this July 22, 2001 file photo.
[Reuters/File]
| But the career diplomat also raised the eyebrows of many traditionalists in
the Roman Catholic country when he began a relationship with a young aide,
Margot Loeffler, prompting his wife of 37 years to walk out on him in 1994.
Klestil married Loeffler in 1998, shortly after being re-elected to a second
term.
Klestil, a conservative like Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel, was a critic of
Schuessel's decision to forge a coalition with the far-right Freedom Party of
Joerg Haider in 2000 -- a decision which resulted in eight months of
international diplomatic sanctions against Austria.
STONY FACE
Klestil, who succeeded Waldheim in 1992, was also known for the famously
stony face he maintained in February 2000 when swearing in the first Austrian
government to include Joerg Haider's far-right Freedom Party .
"The Freedom Party is not a Nazi party," Klestil said in an interview at the
time. "But unfortunately the highest officials of this party continue to use a
language which disqualifies them for every political office."
But Klestil in the end did not use his constitutional powers to dismiss the
government. Instead, he swore in the conservative and far-right ministers with a
stern and unhappy look.
Born in 1932, the youngest of five children of a Vienna tram driver, Klestil
spent 18 of his 35 years as a professional diplomat in the United States.
He went straight from university into the diplomatic service, first with
Austria's mission to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development
in Paris, then to the embassy in Washington as a junior diplomat.
He later served as Austrian ambassador to the United Nations and the United
States.
After resigning from the diplomatic service, he was elected president in 1992
representing the conservative People's Party.
The head of state in Austria has mostly representative functions, but his
voice counts on important issues and he can influence the formation of a
government.
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