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Haider driving at 'twice the speed limit' in crash

12/10/2008

Joerg Haider was driving at twice the speed limit when he lost his life in a car crash on Saturday, police have revealed.

The far-right politician, leader of the BZOe (Alliance for Austria's Future) party, was driving alone near Klagenfurt when his car veered off the road at 142km/h (88mph) in a 70km/h zone.

He suffered severe injuries to his face and chest after his Volkswagen Phaeton V6 flipped several times during the crash and died shortly after.

The incident occurred as Mr Haider was travelling to his mother's 90th birthday celebrations, having left a nightclub.

Though prosecutor Gottfried Kranza confirmed the speed at which Mr Haider had been travelling, it is not yet know if the late politician tested positive for alcohol.

"For us this is the end of the world," BZOe deputy Stefan Petzner was quoted by Austrian news agency APA as saying.

Austrian president Heinz Fischer said Mr Haider's death was a "human tragedy".

A father-of-two, Mr Haider was governor of Carinthia and leader of the BZOe party at the time of his death.

He had last month helped the BZOe party - only formed in 2005 - to its best general election results, gaining 11 per cent of the vote.

However, this success was markedly below the popularity he won while leading the Freedom Party, the time of his greatest political notoriety.

The party gained 27 per cent of the vote under Mr Haider's leadership in 1999, and European Union sanctions were imposed on Austria in 2000 after the Freedom Party formed a coalition with the conservative People's Party/

A controversial figure, Mr Haider's political career was marked by headline-making comments and incidents, mot notably when he criticised the Austrian government's employment slant by comparing it to the "proper labour policies" of the Nazi party.

He once referred to concentration camps as "penal camps" and was also roundly attacked for meeting with Saddam Hussein in 2002, though Mr Haider insisted the discussion was for "purely humanitarian" reasons.

"With his passing, Austria has lost a great political figure," said Heinz-Christian Strache, who took leadership of the Freedom Party after Mr Haider left.