News Brief – October 17, 2008
Auto manufacturers have underlined what many suspect, that Austrian politican Jorg Haider’s car may have been sabotaged before he crashed.
Haider died when his Volkswagen Phaeton veered off the road in the early hours of Saturday morning last week after attending a celebration party for Austria's right wing leaders.
However, the makers of the VW Phaeton limo he was driving insist their car is one of the safest in the world and he should have survived the crash.
VW spokesman Peter Thul claimed that someone with access to Haider’s car key could have manipulated the car’s electrics.
The car giants have sent their own experts to examine the wreckage and search for signs it may have been sabotaged.
“It is a fact that Haider was going too fast but such a speed on that curve is not a problem for the car’s physics” , said the VW spokesman.
“The Phaeton and Audi A8 are the safest of all. You’d need the key to manipulate the electronics, so someone at a garage would have to tamper with it.
Thousands of right-wingers from across Europe are expected to attend his funeral in Klagenfurt on Saturday.
All police leave in Austria has been cancelled in anticipation of clashes between mourners and left wing protestors.
Experts in reconstructing traffic accidents say that the three-month-old Phaeton V6 was capable of a top speed of 150mph and could reach a speed from 0 to 60mph an hour in 9,4 seconds.
In independent tests it scored top marks for the level of safety offered after an accident.
Haider was controversial within Austria and abroad for his anti-immigration stance and the U.S. had criticized him for comments that "could be interpreted as xenophobic or anti-Semitic."
Last updated 21/10/2008
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