- Alois Mock
Alois Mock (born
June 10 1934 ) is a politician and member of theAustrian People's Party (ÖVP). He wasVice Chancellor of Austria from 1987 to 1989. Asforeign minister he helped take Austria into theEuropean Union .Born in Euratsfeld,
Lower Austria , Mock went on to studylaw at theUniversity of Vienna and laterinternational law inBologna andBrussels . In Vienna, he became a member of K.A.V. Norica Wien, a Roman Catholic student fraternity, which is a member of the Cartellverband.From 1961 to 1966 Alois Mock advised the Bundeskanzler
Josef Klaus onEuropean Economic Community andEFTA policy and for theOECD in Paris. In 1966 he became Klaus' cabinet secretary and from 1969-1970 was the youngest education minister Austria had ever had.After the Nationalrat elections of 1971 - where the
Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ) underBruno Kreisky won a majority - he became a member of parliament andmayor of Euratsfeld. From 1971 to 1978, "Lois" chaired the ÖAAB, the most important grouping of the ÖVP. From 1978 to 1987 he was chairman of the parliamentary party and from 1979 was also federal party chairman. He was later to be succeeded byJosef Riegler ,Erhard Busek andWolfgang Schüssel .In 1979, Mock became the
President of theEuropean Democrat Union (EDU), and from 1983 to 1987 also of the international Christian democraticInternational Democratic Union (IDU).At the 1983 elections the ÖVP got almost the same percentage as Kreisky's SPÖ, who did not want to continue without an absolute majority and therefore retired.
Following the 1986 elections, from 1987 to 1989 Alois Mock was Austrian Vice Chancellor in the government of
Franz Vranitzky (SPÖ). He held the position offoreign minister from 1987 to 1995, leading Austria into theEuropean Union . He became one of Austria's most popular politicians.In June 1989, in the area of Odenburg, he cut the wire of the
Iron Curtain at the fortified border withCommunist neighbour Hungary, together with his Hungarian counterpartGyula Horn . During the following months thousands of East German citizens could therefore emigrate to Austria andWest Germany . This marked the beginning of the fall of Communism.Together with
Hans-Dietrich Genscher ofGermany he decided to acknowledge the independence ofSlovenia andCroatia , but Europe nevertheless could not prevent theYugoslavia n wars.In November 1989 Mock was one of the founders of the Central European cooperative called
Pentagonale , which later grew from 5 countries to the 16 of theCEI (Central European Initiative). In 1999 he retired from parliament due toParkinson's disease .External links
* [http://www.globalpanel.org/ The Global Panel Foundation]
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width="30%" align="center" | Preceded by:Josef Taus
width="40%" align="center" | ÖVP Party Chairman
1979–1989
width="30%" align="center" rowspan=2|Josef Riegler
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width="30%" align="center" | Preceded by:Norbert Steger
width="40%" align="center" | Vice Chancellor of Austria
1987–1989
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width="30%" align="center" | Preceded by:Peter Jankowitsch
width="40%" align="center" | Foreign Minister of Austria
1987–1995
width="30%" align="center" | Succeeded by:Wolfgang Schüssel
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