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AMSTERDAM - Murdered maverick Pim Fortuyn personally attracted more than 14 per cent of votes in last week's bombshell Dutch election, final data showed on Tuesday. Over 1.3 million people ticked the dead man's name -- giving him 84 per cent of the votes cast for the three-month-old Pim Fortuyn List (LPF) populist party that took second place as the Netherlands shifted rightwards in the May 15 general election. Fortuyn, who was gunned down nine days before the poll, still had his name on ballot forms because names could not be removed after an April deadline. In Dutch proportional representation,...

To Ground Zero, or next to it, to meet Jorg Haider, the governor of Carinthia and head of the Freedom Party of Austria. There are not many politicians quite like Haider around, certainly not in Europe, where they tend to run to fat, bald, ugly and definitely hypocritical. Haider is trim, athletic, with a full head of hair, suntanned and good-looking, just like the Austrians one sees in ski movies. He also speaks his mind. I particularly liked his aides, young Austrian men with very good manners and none of that "Who the hell are you?" look so many gofers...

PARIS (May 14, 2002 8:42 p.m. EDT) - In life, Dutch populist leader Pim Fortuyn was an upstart maverick, playing on xenophobic fears no traditional politician had dared to tap. In death, following his murder, Mr. Fortuyn drew almost the entire Dutch cabinet to his funeral, amid an outpouring of public sympathy. After parliamentary elections today, his party could hold the balance of power.v Across Europe, in a violent wake-up call to ruling elites, far-right parties beating the anti-immigrant drum have seized on people's concerns about crime and foreigners to shape a new political agenda. And as they move Europe's...

I have just posted the article, which I have been working on for the past several days, prompted by the recent vicious turn in Leftwing politics in Europe. It is called The Big Truth, and basically suggests that Conservatives trying to defend their respective traditions in the various nations under attack from the Left--including America--should answer their foes by a simple iteration of basic truths. Comments are invited. Suggested revisions will be carefully considered. William Flax

The assassination of Pim Fortuyn, a Dutch rightwing politician who was outspoken against the influx of Muslims into Holland and the rest of Europe, and an opponent of immigration, needs to be seen in the larger context of how the growing Muslim population is having an impact throughout Europe and Great Britain. Americans tend to pay little attention to other nations unless they pose a threat to our national security. It is doubtful that the average American could tell you much about the politics of Great Britain or European nations. The recent French elections got everyone’s attention because an avowed...

Anti-immigration party poised to be the big election winnerThe Dutch are expected to vote en masse for a dead man in the general election this week, as a wave of sympathy sweeps the Netherlands for the murdered anti-immigration party leader, Pim Fortuyn. The national mourning for the gay former Marxist academic is like that in Britain for Diana, Princess of Wales. Tens of thousands stood outside Rotterdam cathedral for his funeral on Friday, chanting Fortuyn's name and singing, 'You'll Never Walk Alone'. Most polls published before his murder by an environmental activist last Monday gave his party about 17 per...

THREE days before Christmas 1996, Chris Van de Werken, an environment officer in the sleepy little town of Nunspeet, 40 miles east of Amsterdam, went jogging in the woods near his home. He never came back. Alerted by gunshots, passers-by found Van de Werken's body on a cycle path. Although dozens of people were questioned, no motive was established and nobody was charged. In April 1997 the inquiry was closed. Five years later it has been reopened. This weekend, as the Netherlands mourned Pim Fortuyn, the populist right-wing politician, police were investigating links between his assassination last Monday and what...

Melanie Phillips on how Pim Fortuyn and others hijacked liberal values and provoked a Muslim backlash against liberalism itself At first blush, the murdered Dutch maverick Pim Fortuyn and I would not appear to have been natural bedfellows. He was, after all, a flamboyant, post-Marxist, gay libertarian who advocated sexual permissiveness, casual drug use and euthanasia. I campaign for traditional family values, deeply oppose drug use and euthanasia, and do not employ a butler, wear a spaniel under my arm or smoke Cuban cigars. However, one thing he stood for did ring a bell with me. He was, above all,...

<p>Since we suffer from acute political "taxonomitis" in America--a reflexive condition that compels us to label people as right- or left-wing, or liberal, conservative, fascist and so forth, without much concession to shade or nuance--we've all been flummoxed by the murder of Pim Fortuyn.</p>

If the growing popularity of an extreme right-wing party bewildered and frightened the Dutch, the assassination of its leader, Tim Fortuyn, earlier this week appears to have numbed their faculties. His spectacular success in the local elections last March, and the even more striking success that opinion polls predicted for him in the general election scheduled for May 15, had rattled the political establishment and large sections of public opinion. They simply could not understand how the xenophobic outpourings of Fortuyn could strike a chord in a country which is envied for its prosperity, welfare measures, political stability, progressive laws,...

© 2002 Creators Syndicate, Inc. "Volkert van der Graf, 32, is a slender, blond-haired Dutchman whose pictures reveal nothing special except perhaps a taut, ascetic look. "But for almost a decade, friends and associates say, this quiet man and strict vegetarian has been consumed by his fight to reduce the suffering of animals reared in industrial quantities for food, fur coats or medical experiments." Sounds like a description of St. Francis of Assisi, doesn't it? But it is not. These are the lead paragraphs in The New York Times story that describes the enviro-fanatic charged with gunning down Dutch politician...

Joao Varela wept without shame as the Netherlands reeled in shock after the assassination of Pim Fortuyn. "He was like a father to me," the young deputy to the anti-immigrant politician said in a brief TV appearance. "He was very inspiring and could have made a difference for Holland." It was another extraordinary moment in the extraordinary drama that has shaken this quiet and prosperous country since the charismatic and controversial populist was killed on Monday by a lone gunman days before the general election. For the acting leader of Lijst Pim Fortuyn (LPF) - which is now likely to...

AMSTERDAM: Dozens of threatening letters containing an unidentified white powder were sent to some 80 Dutch Hindu groups this week, accusing them of supporting murdered politician Pim Fortuyn, one of the groups said on Thursday. But the organisations had not taken any stand in support of anti-immigration campaigner Fortuyn, who was shot dead on Monday just as his new party was surging in opinion polls, said a representative of the Hindu group SHPN. The letters, signed "Dutch al-Qaeda", were received on Monday and Tuesday. They have been reported to the police. Fortuyn's party had been expected to win some 17...

Thousands of people from all over the Netherlands are paying their last respects in Rotterdam to the murdered politician Pim Fortuyn. Fortuyn, who had been due to lead his controversial anti-immigration party into next week's general election, was shot dead on Monday in the city of Hilversum. His body is lying in state at the city's Roman Catholic cathedral. The Netherlands has not seen such an event since 1962, when Queen Wilhelmina died. Many had been queuing for five hours for the chance to file past his open coffin. By early afternoon, the crowd was so large that the cathedral...

"I won't say nothing, phone my lawyer"Reformatisch Dagblad By Jan van Klinken, AMSTERDAM - Volkert van der G., the 32 year old man from Harderwijk that is the suspect in the Pim Fortuyn killing, is part of a wide spread netwerk of actiongroups. In that world the panic increased lately. The incredible victory that List Pim Fortuyn was heading to, was a nightmare for the (ultra)left actionnetwork. "I won't say anything, phone my lawyer mr. Bakker Schut." Was the only thing that Volkert van der G. would say to the police after he was arrested six minutes after the murder...

The body of murdered Dutch politician Pim Fortuyn is to lie in Rotterdam Cathedral the day before his funeral, the Dutch Catholic Church has said. Church spokesman Peter van Zoest told BBC News Online: "It is the wish of the family and it is very unusual. There will be a lot of people." Funerals of even high officials in the Netherlands are often private affairs. It is believed that the last time a body lay in state in the Netherlands was in 1962 when Queen Wilhelmina died. Mr Van Zoest said it was unclear if the body of the...

A 32-year-old animal rights activist was remanded in custody by an Amsterdam court on suspicion of murdering Dutch far-right leader Pim Fortuyn, a court spokeswoman told AFP."The judge felt there were sufficient grounds to keep the suspect in custody," said spokeswoman Mercedes Grootscholten.The man has not been formally charged as the murder investigation is still ongoing, she added. The court refused to confirm the identify of the suspect, who has been widely named as Volkert van der Graaf.A spokesman for the prosecutor said earlier that the prosecution intends to charge the suspect with murder.According to press reports, Van der...

An animal lover assassinated by a vegan ...a nationalist, he will be buried abroad PIM FORTUYN told The Times last week that he was driven above all by a love of The Netherlands. But the murdered Dutch nationalist has chosen to be buried in a small village in Italy. Mr Fortuyn was a well-known animal lover who was never without his lapdogs Kenneth and Carla. The man suspected of killing him is a vegan animal rights activist who believes that protecting animals civilises people. Mr Fortuyn’s views on immigration were reviled by many in The Netherlands. Yet thousands turned out...

Statement Animal Freedom (may 7, 2002). Volkert is not and was not a member of Animal Freedom. This text is from an interview done by phone 2 years ago.Volkert van der Graaf Even in elementary school I was interested in animals, the environment and nature. I was a member of the WWF Rangers, and we did things like picking up garbage in the dunes, etc. I also used to fish, with my brother who was two years older. I used to get a kick out of catching fish. My brother put the worms on the hook. I did think it...

Thousands of people have taken part in a rally in the Dutch city of Rotterdam in protest at the assassination of right-wing politician Pim Fortuyn. The Dutch Government has announced next week's general election will go ahead as planned, despite Fortuyn's murder on Monday evening. Police say they have detained their prime suspect in the case - a 32-year-old white Dutchman. Reports say he was an animal-rights activist angered by Fortuyn's calls to lift a ban on fur farming. The public prosecutor said ammunition was found at the suspect's house, matching the calibre of the bullets which killed Fortuyn. Police...