False Accusation Against Strache: Verdict Reached
The verdict must be published in the weekly newspaper "Falter." In the book "Resistance Has No Form, Resistance Is the Form," Festwochen director Milo Rau wrote that the former FPÖ leader sang an SS song. The publisher plans a corrected new edition.
Apology from Publisher
"Resistance Has No Form, Resistance Is the Form" is a collection of speeches and essays by the director. According to the defense attorney for the publisher led by Kristine Listau and Jörg Sundermeier, the book has already been recalled and is no longer being sold. Around 700 copies were purchased or ordered as press copies. An apology from the publisher has already been posted on social media and published on the publisher's website: "In the book 'Resistance Has No Form, Resistance Is the Form' on page 100, we claim that Heinz-Christian Strache sang the SS song 'We Create the Seventh Million.' We retract this claim as untrue. We apologize for this false claim." The retraction is signed by the two publishers as well as by Milo Rau himself. In addition to the planned corrected new edition in October, according to the defense attorney for Verbrecher Verlag, there will also be an art action in which the said part will be physically cut out of the book.
Criticism from Strache's Lawyer
Strache's lawyer Maximilian Donner-Reichstädter criticized the lack of seriousness of the statement during the trial, as no personal apology had been received. He also announced further legal action by his client against Milo Rau personally, as he had made the same claim in 2024 in an interview with Elfriede Jelinek on the website of the Vienna Festwochen.
Rau had written: "What can be learned from a time - ours - in which a member of the largest Austrian party, the FPÖ, a man named H.C. Strache, sings the SS song 'We Create the Seventh Million' in the morning and visits the Yad Vashem memorial in the afternoon, where the Holocaust dead are commemorated? He was apparently referring to the 2018 uncovered 'songbook' affair. In songbooks of fraternities, the line 'Then in their midst came the Jew Ben Gurion: 'Give gas, you old Germans, we create the seventh million'' was found - a mockery of the mass murder of Jews during the Nazi era.
Strache Not Present
Strache was represented by his lawyer at the trial and was therefore not personally present. Both parties now have three days to file further legal remedies before the verdict becomes final. Meanwhile, Milo Rau, together with Verbrecher Verlag and the association DIE VIELEN, invites to a press conference in Berlin on Friday at 7 p.m. about the verdict before the guest performance premiere of the Festwochen production "The Seer" at the Schaubühne at 8:30 p.m. "Legal crossfire is just the beginning! Under pressure from the right, we respond with public debate and civil society resistance!" Rau is quoted in the invitation.
(APA/Red)
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