Tag: #nationalfeiertag

Today is Nationalfeiertag in Austria. It's is kind of like our "Independence Day".
After the Second World War, Austria was occupied by the 4 winners of the war, USA, France, Great Britain, and Russia. The whole nation was split into the 4 allied zones.

In 1955 they all signed a contract to give us back our independence. They removed all troops and we guaranteed to stay a free democracy. On October 26th we also signed a law to state our "everlasting neutrality" to never ever again participate in any armed conflict. This, for example, is the reason we will never enter into NATO and was even a big problem for our entry into the European Union. Morality like this really impacts a lot of Austria's foreign policies and even though we are a small country (9 million inhabitants) we host many UN-Organization's Headquarters, among them IAEA (organization to inhibit the use of nuclear power for war efforts), UNIDO (organization to assist countries with their industrial growth and development), UNCITRAL (organization for international trade law), OPEC (organization of most oil-exporting countries) and of course many other offices for UN or other organizations like it.

So even while very small and essentially without any real military strength, Austria is often involved in international affairs, mainly because we have a very good track record of being unbiased.

This and many other reasons mean, today i am a proud girl saying: I Am From Austria. Even though it's in German, I hope this video gives you small peek into our soul - it is the in unofficial Austrian Anthem and everyone knows it by heart.

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