Former Austrian leader Kurz sentenced for false testimony in Parliament

Former Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz was sentenced on Friday to eight months probation for making false statements to a parliamentary committee, according to Austrian media.

The 37-year-old conservative Kurz, former leader of the ruling People’s Party (ÖVP), was found guilty of one of three charges related to making false statements to a parliamentary committee in 2020 when he was head of government. Prosecutors accused Kurz of lying when he denied his involvement in appointing one of his closest associates, Thomas Schmid, as chairman of the state-owned holding company ÖBAG, and also in designating the supervisory board of the same company. In a first-instance verdict, delivered Friday after twelve hearings, the Vienna Regional Court found that the former head of government had exercised more influence than he admitted.

Kurz, who had denied all charges, called the verdict “very unfair” and his lawyers filed an appeal.

In addition to the former chancellor, his former chief of staff, Bernhard Bonelli, was also found guilty and sentenced to six months’ probation. Kurz, once one of the great stars of the European Christian Democrats, resigned in 2021 due to another investigation into alleged corruption and later left politics altogether to pursue a business career.

The trial focused on the former leader’s testimony about the handling of the coalition he led between the ÖVP and the far-right FPÖ from 2017 until its downfall in 2019. The coalition collapsed in 2019 when the FPÖ leader was implicated in a video sting operation.

Kurz then won a snap election and formed another coalition with the Greens, who later forced him out of office in 2021 due to the corruption investigation. This trial is only part of the charges against Kurz and may be less serious than the ongoing corruption investigation into the alleged use of public funds to commission favorable opinion polls.