European Women Mayors News

Women Mayors reporting from Europe

> Mass shooting in Graz shocks Austria

> Zagreb re-elects progressive mayor

> London borough mayor condemns Gaza inhumanity

> Amsterdam mayor issues Holocaust apology

Graz Mayor Elke Kahr speaks after the mass shooting at the city’s ‘BORG Dreierschützengasse’ grammar school

AUSTRIA / GRAZ / SHOOTING

The Mayor of Graz calls for solidarity after Austria’s worst mass shooting and urges stricter gun control

June 2025: The whole of Austria is in mourning after the worst shooting rampage in the country’s history. Ten people lost their lives when a former pupil opened fire at a grammar school in Graz (Styria). On Tuesday morning (10 June 2025), a 21-year-old former pupil of the ‘BORG Dreierschützengasse’ school opened fire in the school building at around 10.00 am. The shooter was armed with a handgun and a rifle. He shot dead nine pupils and one teacher and injured dozens. He then took his own life in a toilet.

According to a police spokesperson, the gunman was travelling with a pistol and a shotgun that he legally owned. He was unemployed and had left school, the institution where he killed nine pupils and a teacher in his former classroom, without graduating. Various reports say that he saw himself as a victim of bullying.

A digital and analogue suicide note, addressed to his parents, was found in his home. The message seems to rule out any political motives.

Elke Kahr, the Mayor of Graz and winner of the 2023 World Mayor Prize, said the city was standing together like never before. “It is characteristic of the city's people to help each other at times of adversity.”

The next few days will be about talking to the pupils about the events, said the mayor in an interview. “It is important to reassure children that they are safe and supported by everyone working in schools.”

The mayor also repeated her conviction that it is far too easy for private citizens to obtain guns. She called for a ban on weapons in the private sector. “Weapons should only be issued to people who carry them as part of their professional duties, not to private individuals.” Elke Kahr has always held this opinion, and the current situation has convinced her “all the more”.

Many experts agree with Mayor Kahr. “It is far too easy to be given a gun permit. All it takes is to be of age (21 Years), to live at a permanent address and to have no criminal record.” Some 1.5 million weapons are registered in Austria, a country of nine million people, with an above-average number in Styria, where Graz is the state capital.

Further reading: Mayor of Graz wins World Mayor Prize

CROATIA / LOCAL ELECTIONS

Progressive mayor is re-elected in Zagreb, but conservatives dominate in small-town Croatia

June 2025: In the second round of local elections held in Croatia on 1 June 2025, the country’s conservative governing party, HDZ (Christian Democratic Union), strengthened its hold on communities across the country. The party collected some 49 per cent of the national vote, winning in 280 constituencies.

However, voters in the capital city of Zagreb re-elected the incumbent mayor from the left-green Mozema party. In his bid for a second term, Tomislav Tomašević was also backed by the centre-left Social Democratic Party (SDP). Mozema, whose name means ‘We can’ (inspired by the Spanish left-wing Podemos), became attractive to young, professional people who demanded that the city becomes liveable for all. During the Zagreb mayor’s first term, investors were controlled, uncontrolled building was regulated with an urban development plan, and affordable housing was built.

The conservative HDZ has its strongholds in small towns and rural parts of the country. But it also won in Split, Croatia's second-largest city. Tomislav Šuta defeated the incumbent mayor Ivica Puljak. The HDZ was thus able to recapture the Adriatic city after four years.

For the first time in independent Croatia, the port city of Rijeka in Istria will be governed by a woman mayor. Independent candidate Iva Rinčić won with just under 65 the vote against the incumbent mayor Marko Filipović. Rinčić, who was supported by smaller liberal parties, had already won the first round by a clear margin and went into the run-off as the favourite.

In the run-off elections on Sunday, mayors were elected in a total of 47 towns and 61 municipalities, and the heads of twelve counties were also elected. Overall, there is a deep divide in Croatia between the progressive and bourgeois urban population and the conservative rural areas.

Sources: City of Zagreb; TAZ (Berlin); Croatia Week; BGNES News Agency

LONDON / WAR IN GAZA

London borough mayor joins religious leaders in condemning the abdication of humanity in Gaza

Report by Josef Steen

May 2025: Caroline Woodley, the Mayor of the London borough of Hackney, said in a statement that she strongly condemns the expansion of Israel’s military operation in Gaza and the wholly inadequate provision of aid.

"Our Hackney communities, along with many thousands of voices raised across Britain, have been constant and clear that more needs to be done by our government and our allies to stop military operations in Gaza and immediately allow access to humanitarian aid. The joint statement by the leaders of the UK, Canada and France affirms the importance of engaging with the UN to ensure a return to the delivery of aid in line with humanitarian principles and calls on Hamas to immediately release the remaining hostages held since the heinous attack on 7 October 2023.”

On Wednesday, 21 May, Mayor Woodley gathered with faith leaders and others at a peace vigil, marking the “grief and horror” of the conflict. Members from Hackney’s Christian, Jewish and Muslim communities were present. Her voice breaking, Mayor Woodley said: “What I feel in my heart, in all honesty, is overwhelming shame – that I lead a borough that sees poverty, division, and has communities who have cried out for change in the face of genocide and famine, not only in Gaza, but across the world.

She added that people were now hearing stories that “make us question our humanity”.

Local clergyman Father William Taylor began the vigil with a call to stand and “share some silence” together. Rabbi Herschel Gluck said: “We are gathered here today in a place which is called a common, and we all have something in common.” Mohammed Maljee, from Masjid Quba, described his feeling of isolation living in the borough since the war’s outbreak. “The Quran says the person who kills one soul has killed humanity and the person who saves one soul has saved humanity,” he said.

Further reading: Israel’s attacks on cities in Gaza cause destruction and death on an unimaginable scale

PARIS / HOLIDAYS FOR THE YOUNG

Paris offers young people a helping hand to go on holiday

May 2025: To help young Parisians go on holiday, the Paris City government has set up the ‘Paris Jeunes Vacances’ scheme, providing €200 (US$225) in assistance to teenagers and people in their twenties.

Young people aged between 16 and 30 who live in Paris simply need to submit an application form by 2 June 2025. The Paris Department of Youth and Sport will then examine the applications and inform the Paris mayor’s office of the list of beneficiaries. Beneficiaries will then be able to collect their holiday vouchers within three months. Proof of tourist accommodation (hotel, campsite, hostel, etc.) for a minimum of two nights and three days will be required in addition to proof of identity and address details.

The scheme is also available for other holiday periods throughout the year: the deadline for the autumn holidays is 22 September, while for the Christmas holidays, people will need to apply before 24 November.

Not all young people qualify for the holiday money. Excluded are those who earn above €17,000 a year or receive social security benefits or education grants.

Source: Ville de Paris (Paris City Hall)

AMSTERDAM / HOLOCAUST

Amsterdam Mayor apologises for the city’s role in the Holocaust

“The Amsterdam government, when it came down to it, was not heroic, not determined and not merciful. And it let its Jewish residents down terribly.”

May 2025: The Mayor of the Dutch capital Femke Halsema issued a formal apology for the city’s involvement in the persecution and deportation of Jews during World War II. She was speaking from the Jewish Cultural Quarter during a commemoration service on the annual Holocaust Remembrance Day in April 2025.

The mayor acknowledged the municipality’s failure to protect its Jewish citizens during the event for Yom HaShoah, acknowledging that “when it truly mattered, the Amsterdam government was not brave, not resolute, and not compassionate enough. It gravely failed its Jewish residents”.

On behalf of the city government, she offered her “sincere apologies” and stated that there is a responsibility to remember and honour the victims of the Holocaust. She detailed how the city government actively collaborated with the occupying Nazi forces — from mapping out Jewish residences and enforcing registration requirements to making public transport available for deportations. She also described the mandatory registration of Jews as a critical step in their systemic dehumanisation and extermination, resulting in the murder of 60,000 Jewish Amsterdammers.

By early 1941, Jews were required by the German forces to register with the authorities. In total, about 160,000 people registered throughout the whole of the Netherlands, including thousands of refugees and individuals of mixed heritage and some 25,000 Jewish refugees from the German Reich, like the family of the diary author and Amsterdam resident Anne Frank.

The Dutch Institute for War, Holocaust and Genocide Studies will soon complete an investigation into the role of all municipal services that were involved in the exclusion and persecution of Jewish Amsterdammers during World War II.

The Netherlands, which had maintained neutrality for a century before the outbreak of WWII, was invaded by Nazi Germany on 10 May 1940. Between 1942 and 1945, over 107,000 Jews from the Netherlands were deported, mostly to concentration camps in Auschwitz and Sobibor, where the majority were killed.

Four years ago, Mayor Halsema apologized for Amsterdam’s role in another dark moment in history, the global slave trade.

Report by Nazrin Sadigova

BRITAIN / LOCAL ELECTIONS

Women feature strongly in English mayoral elections

May 2025: On 1 May, voters in many parts of England elected new local councils as well as four metro mayors and two city mayors.

Greater Lincolnshire’s first metro mayor will be Andrea Jenkyns from the Reform Party. She received 40 per cent of the vote, some 14 percentage points ahead of the Conservative candidate. The new mayor, who switched from the Conservative Party to Reform, was a Tory member of Parliament from 2015 to 2024. For a few months in 2022, she was a junior member of Boris Johnson’s government.

Labour successfully defended its hold on the West of England metro region. Helen Godwin fended off a challenge from Reform, with the Green Party candidate in a strong third place. The new mayor will be replacing Dan Norris, who led the region from 2021 to 2025.

Ros Jones, England’s longest-serving female mayor, was re-elected in Doncaster with a wafer-thin majority of 700 votes. In the weeks leading up to the election, the Labour mayor faced an increasingly strong challenge from her Reform opponent.

The Labour Party also managed to hold on to the mayorship of North Tyneside. The newly elected mayor, Karen Clark, will be replacing Norma Redfearn, who decided to step down after 12 years in office.

Cambridgeshire & Peterborough delivered a consolation prize for the Conservatives. The party’s successful candidate, Paul Bristow, benefited from former Labour voters switching to the right-wing Reform Party and the centre-left Liberal Democrats. Bristow was a conservative Member of Parliament for Peterborough from 2019 to 2024. In last year’s general election, he was defeated by his Labour opponent.

Further reading: Full elections results and background |

AUSTRIA / VIENNA ELECTIONS

Vienna remains firmly in the hands of the Social Democrats

April 2025: Despite slight losses, Austria’s Social Democrats (SPÖ) resoundingly won yesterday’s (27 April) municipal elections in Vienna. The centre-left party, which has governed the Austrian capital since 1945, captured close to 40 per cent of the votes cast and now has the choice of three coalition partners. The right-wing Freedom Party (FPÖ) made strong gains and achieved almost 21 per cent. The Greens maintained their share of the vote with 14 per cent, while the centre-left Liberals (NEOS) were supported by ten per cent of voters. The big loser of the night was the conservative Austrian People’s Party (ÖVP), whose share of the vote dropped from more than 20 per cent to less than 10 per cent. The main beneficiary of the Conservatives’ losses was the FPÖ. The Communist Party (KPÖ) doubled its share of the vote since the 2020 elections.

Results of Vienna's local elections, held on 27 April 2025

SPÖ (centre-left) 39.1% (41.6%). A good result for a party that has been in power for some 80 years

FPÖ (right-wing) 20.7% (7.1%). The right-wing, anti-immigrant party has overcome the scandals under its former leader, Heinz-Christian Strache.

ÖVP (conservative) 9.7% (20.4%). A disastrous result for the party that leads the Austrian government. It is thought that the FPÖ largely benefited from the unpopularity of the Conservatives.

Greens (ecological) 14.2% (14.8%)

NEOS (centre-left liberal) 9.8% (7.5%)

KPÖ (communist) 4.0% (2.1%). The Austrian communists have developed into a progressive, pro-women party that appeals to many young leftist voters.

While Vienna’s SPÔ Mayor Michael Ludwig has said that he will hold talks with the Liberals, Greens and Conservatives, it is thought that the Austrian capital’s new government will again be a coalition between the SPÖ and the NEOS.

POPE FRANCIS

Pope Francis, a man of peace, who was despised by warmongers

April 2025; Pope Francis, the first Latin American leader of the Roman Catholic Church, has died, the Vatican announced on Monday, 21 April, He was 88, and had suffered a serious bout of double pneumonia earlier this year, but his death came as a shock after he had been driven around St. Peter's Square in an open-air popemobile to greet cheering crowds on Easter Sunday. Within hours of the formal announcement of Pope Francis’ death, mayors from across Italy recalled the Pope’s visits to their communities and his support for the least well off in urban societies.

Further reading: Mayors from across the world mourn the death of Pope Francis

Britain’s Supreme Court has narrowed the definition of who is a woman under the law

April 2025: Britain’s Supreme Court ruled on 16 April 2025 that only ‘biological’ women and not trans women meet the definition of a woman under equality laws. The three judges did so unanimously but without defining the term ‘biological’. A biological woman is generally understood to be a person born with female reproductive organs. However, many in the trans community argue that this definition is too narrow and does not take into account a person’s psychological state.

Following the Supreme Court ruling, authorities in Britain will now be allowed to exclude trans women from single-sex services for women, such as refuges, hospital wards, and sports. Transgender campaigners now believe that the decision could lead to discrimination, especially over employment issues.

The judgment follows legal action by the campaign group, For Women Scotland (FWS), against guidance issued by the Scottish government that said a trans woman with a gender recognition certificate (GRC)* was legally a woman. FWS lost its case in the Scottish courts, but the Supreme Court has now ruled in its favour.

While the British Court warned against using its ruling “as a triumph for one or more groups in our society at the expense of another”, members of FWS were jubilant, saying that “the judges have said what we always believed to be the case: that women are protected by their biological sex, that sex is real and that women can now feel safe that services and spaces designated for women are for women.”

Not just in Britain, transgender rights have become a political issue. In the US, legal challenges have mushroomed since President Trump issued an executive order barring transgender people from military service.

Globally, transgender rights vary significantly from country to country. They range from legal recognition of gender identity and protection against discrimination to criminalisation and even death penalties in some cases. Some countries have made considerable strides in protecting transgender rights, while others continue to lag, highlighting the global disparity in legal and social acceptance.

* The GRC is a formal document giving legal recognition of someone's new gender

HUNGARY

Budapest Mayor assures LGBT community that this year’s Pride will take place

April 2025: In 1997, Hungary was the first former Eastern Bloc country to hold a Pride festival and march in Budapest. It has been an annual event ever since, celebrating diversity and harmony between the country’s LGBT community and the wider population. Now, the authoritarian government of Prime Minister Victor Orbán and his right-wing Fidesz party passed a constitutional amendment in parliament that would allow the government to ban LGBT events, including this year’s Pride march scheduled for 28 June.

Government supporters declared that the amendment was necessary to “protect children’s rights to moral, physical and spiritual development.” Hungary’s controversial ‘child protection law’ prohibits the “depiction or promotion” of homosexuality to minors aged under 18.

Opposition lawmakers accused the Prime Minister’s Fidesz party of hiding behind children to promote their right-wing agenda. “Fidesz acted disgracefully and cowardly.”

The amendment codifies a law that was passed by parliament in March 2025 that bans public events held by LGBT communities. That law also allows authorities to use facial recognition tools to identify people who attend prohibited events.

Outside parliament, the most outspoken opponent of Victor Orbán is Budapest’s Mayor Gergely Karácsony, In a defiant statement, he assured the organisers of this year’s Pride that the festival and parade will take place. “It may even be bigger than ever before.”

Gergely Karácsony sees the government's narrative of banning Pride as a smear campaign triggered by what he says are mounting problems in the country. “In Budapest, we know that when everyone is treated equally, when everyone's human dignity, faith, religion, beliefs and orientation are respected, then we can talk about freedom.”

The European Union (EU) also condemned the legislative changes in Hungary. Speaking in the European Parliament on “Recent legislative changes in Hungary and their impact on fundamental rights”, the EU Commissioner for the Rule of Law, Michael McGrath, said there was no room for discrimination in the European Union. He was referring to the amendment of the assembly law, effectively banning the Pride parade in Budapest.