A scene from 2014 is unforgettable.

At that time, Austria had rolled out the red carpet for Vladimir Putin in Vienna, less than three months after the illegal annexation of the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea by Russia.

While the political leadership, at that time still in a social-democratic coalition of SPÖ and ÖVP, spoke of keeping channels of communication open, lucrative contracts were signed, among others between the energy companies OMV and Gazprom.

This culminated in Putin being able to call out to Christoph Leitl, President of the Chamber of Commerce at the time, that this was a “dictatorship – but a good dictatorship” because of his long term in office, to the laughter of the hosts.

Stephen Lowenstein

Political correspondent based in Vienna.

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These scenes, which some of those involved also found embarrassing in retrospect, mark a time when OMV was increasingly geared towards Russia.

On Tuesday, this was the topic of the ÖVP committee of inquiry.

The former OMV boss Gerhard Roiss was heard.

He had offered himself as a witness for the prosecution, so to speak, by indicating in interviews that OMV had been pushed in this direction against his own concerns.

Roiss has been CEO of the group since 2011, in which the state holds a third.

However, after automotive entrepreneur Siegfried Wolf became chairman of the supervisory board of state investment company ÖIAG in 2014, Roiss was informed that they wanted to go their separate ways.

His successor was the German Rainer Seele, formerly head of Wintershall.

Roiss now testified that under Wolf it had been explained to him that his OMV strategy was no longer appropriate.

He relied heavily on gas from Norway.

A second third should come from Romania, a third pillar should be gas from Austrian deposits and Russia.

The "Nabucco" project, which was supposed to bring gas from Azerbaijan to Europe, failed.

Negotiations were held against his will about a stake in the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline in the Baltic Sea and, without his knowledge, about swapping Norwegian gas fields for a stake in Russia.

This planned "swap" was "fortunately stopped" by the Norwegian government in 2018, otherwise dependence on Russian gas would be 90 or 95 percent today instead of 80 percent, Roiss said on Tuesday.

The liberal opposition party Neos had hoped that the surveys would provide insights into whether the ties to Russia were simply due to "myopia and incompetence" or whether politicians had hoped to benefit from them.

The Greens, who are now coalition partners with the ÖVP, criticized that "former chancellor Kurz and his power circle" had maneuvered Austria into a "dangerous situation" with their Russia policy.

Of course, as the scene from 2014 shows, Vienna had been looking for a cozy relationship with Putin before.

However, the role of Wolf, who was already big in the Russian business in the automotive sector and who, on the other hand, enjoyed questionable tax deals during Kurz's "turquoise" period, is worth further questions, and the corruption prosecutor's office is also interested in them.