Suche
Mein Konto
FPÖ asks: Where will the 8 million for traumatized refugees go?
The FPÖ is demanding clarification from Interior Minister Karner about 8.4 million euros for asylum coordination and support for traumatized refugees in Vienna.
FPÖ asks: Where will the 8 million for traumatized refugees go?
On November 13, 2025, the FPÖ submitted a request to Interior Minister Gerhard Karner (ÖVP) regarding the promotion of asylum coordination in Austria. This concerns a considerable sum of 8,493,898.03 euros, which was made available in the legislative period from October 23, 2019 to October 23, 2024. FPÖ National Council member Reinhold Maier is pushing for information about the specific measures and projects that were supported with this considerable sum.
Minister Karner is required to respond to the request by next week. The Asylum Coordination Austria acts as coordinator of the project “NIPE – Network for Intercultural Psychotherapy after Extreme Traumatization”, which is responsible for the psychological support of severely traumatized refugees in all federal states. As part of the funding of over 8 million euros, which does not flow annually but over a longer period of time, the project receives 1.4 million euros annually.
Comprehensive support for traumatized people
The funding comes from the European Union and the Ministry of the Interior and is intended to ensure that the NGOs offer a total of 172,000 hours of treatment for traumatized refugees between 2023 and 2029. Hemayat, a care center for torture and war survivors in Vienna, is also part of the NIPE network. In 2024, the center was able to provide assistance to 1,801 people, including 256 children.
It is important to emphasize that the funds may only be used for clinical psychological care and psychotherapy. Compliance with this regulation is regularly checked by the Ministry of the Interior. In addition, the asylum coordination receives 42,000 euros annually from the Ministry of the Interior for the administrative processing and documentation of the project.
Review of previous funding
An interesting aspect of this inquiry is that although large sums were paid out to care facilities in the past during Herbert Kickl's term as Interior Minister - a total of 3,679,999.98 euros between 2017 and 2019 - the current inquiry only looks at the funding after Kickl's term of office. This raises questions about what the FPÖ is aiming at with its request.
The growing importance of psychological support for traumatized refugees is increasingly recognized, and supporting such projects could be a key to offering these people a piece of normality. It remains to be seen how Interior Minister Karner will respond to the FPÖ request and what information he can provide.