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Dr Wolfgang Schűssel is a member of the Austrian Parliament and former Chancellor of Austria. Latterly, he has been Chairman of the Parliamentary Group of the ÖVP in coalition with the Social Democratic Party of Austria. Since November 2008 he has been the ÖVP Group’s speaker for international and European affairs.

He studied law at the University of Vienna.

He began his political career in 1968 as Expert Assistant to the Parliamentary Group of the Austrian People’s Party (ÖVP). In 1975 he became Secretary General of the Austrian Business Federation, one of the three branches of the ÖVP. From 1989 to 1995 he was Minister for Economic Affairs in the coalition Austrian Federal Government and was then elected Chairman of the ÖVP. He became Vice-Chancellor and Minister for Foreign Affairs in 1995 and Federal Chancellor of the Republic of Austria in 2000 – a position he held until 2007.