Vienna - President Thomas Klestil won a second six-year term as head of state in Austria yesterday with 63.49 per cent of the vote, provisional official results showed. His two nearest challengers were women.
Announcing the results on television, the Interior Minister, Mr Karl Schlogl, said the Lutheran bishop, Dr Gertraud Knoll, a political novice, came second with 13.53 per cent.
The Liberal Forum leader, Ms Heide Schmidt, won 11.08 per cent of the vote, followed by a self-made construction tycoon, Mr Richard Lugner, with 9.94 per cent and a pro-neutrality campaigner, Mr Karl Walter Nowak, on 1.95 per cent.