Austria

The IWÖ is a non-party association established in 1994. After the accession of Austria to the EU, it was necessary to adopt the Austrian weapons law to the more strict weapons regulation of the European Union. Some IWÖ members and experts participated in the elaboration of the new weapons law of 1996, they therefore could successfully retain to a weapons law that is relatively liberal in comparison to European standards.

After some spectacular bloody deeds, weapons owner had been put under political and medial pressure since 1997 and discussions started to prohibit the private possession of firearms at all. This decision would not only have effected the possession of handguns, but also of collector’s pieces manufactured after 1871. The argument of the destruction of cultural and technic-historical heritage was not accepted and as a compromise the de-activation was offered. Given the above circumstances, the IWÖ started a successful campaign- supported by 167.000 people- to maintain the status-quo of the well-proven Austrian weapons law. At the moment, the private possession of firearms is not under political discussion. As for the FESAC, the IWÖ enjoyed observer status at the beginning.

At the FESAC Congress in Oslo/Norway in 2002, the IWÖ application for full membership was unanimously adopted and Dr. Hermann Gerig, Executive Member of the IWÖ, was designated as IWÖ representative at the FESAC. Since 2006, Dr. Gerig has been also Board Member of the FESAC.

President: Dr. Franz Csaszar
General Secretary: Dr. Georg Zakrajsek
Board member of FESAC and IWÖ: Dr. Hermann Gerig. He represents the gun collectors in the IWÖ.