Russian President Vladimir Putin attended the wedding of Austrian Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl on Saturday, in a visit that the opposition says has damaged Austria’s reputation for political neutrality. Putin was one of around 100 guests at Kneissl’s wedding to businessman Wolfgang Meilinger in the picturesque village of Gamlitz in southeastern Austria. Among the other guests at the wedding were Kurz, of the centre-right People’s Party (OeVP) and Vice-Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache, of the far-right Freedom Party (FPOe). Kneissl was nominated for the post of foreign minister by the FPOe, which since 2016 has had a “cooperation pact” with Putin’s United Russia party. What happened in Austria reminds me of what autocrats would do,” one senior European intelligence official told the paper.

Source: Punch August 18, 2018 17:37 UTC