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Austria has apparently stepped back from the brink of being the first EU country to elect a far-right head of state, electing a 72-year-old Green candidate to the country's presidency yesterday in a surprise move that will be welcomed by Europe's political establishment.

According to the BBC, postal votes counted yesterday gave Alexander Van der Bellen the victory by a narrow margin over Norbert Hofer (pictured) of the Freedom Party.

Mr Van der Bellen won by the slimmest of margins, with 50.1pc of the vote, according to Austria's 'Kurier' newspaper.

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"It's now clear: Alexander van der Bellen will be the new president," Austria's 'Die Presse' newspaper reported.

Mr Hofer came within an ace of victory, with 49.9pc. He conceded defeat in a statement posted on to his Facebook page yesterday afternoon.

www.independent.ie

Mr Hofer's failure to become the EU's first far-right head of state will be a blow to Europe's burgeoning populist movements, including France's Front National and Germany's Alternative for Deutschland (Afd) who had hoped that a Hofer victory would provide the catalyst for continent-wide electoral gains.

It will also come as a huge relief in Brussels and among Europe's establishment parties who have been under assault in recent years from populist movements angry over uncontrolled immigration and economic austerity and had warned that a Hofer victory would "change the character" of Europe.

Among them was French Prime Minister Manuel Valls, who expressed his "relief" at learning Mr Hofer had failed to win the election.

"Relief to see the Austrians reject populism and extremism," Mr Valls wrote on Twitter, "everyone in Europe should learn from this."

Chief Rabbi Goldschmidt, president of the Conference of European Rabbis, said: "We would like to congratulate Mr Van der Bellen on his victory in the Austrian Presidential election.

"This is a clear sign that Europe is beginning to realise that hate and fear politics are not the answer to the many challenges we are facing as a continent. "As we approach our standing committee meeting in Vienna, I look forward to meeting the new president and working with him to help the Jewish community."

News of Mr Hofer's defeat received a predictably muted reaction in his home town of Pinkafeld, a picture-postcard small town an hour's drive south of Vienna.

"I'm disappointed. When I saw the result on the TV I switched it off, I couldn't watch," said 74-year-old Irene Schutter, a retired school cleaner drinking coffee in the town's market square.

Greek authorities began a dawn operation to evacuate the country's largest informal refugee camp of Idomeni, blocking access to the area and sending in more than 400 riot police.

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Greek policemen stand next to migrants at a makeshift refugee camp at the Greek-Macedonian border near the northern Greek village of Idomeni. (AP Photo/Boris Grdanoski)		The vast majority are from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. Nearly a million people have passed through Greece, most arriving on islands from the nearby Turkish coast. In March, the European Union reached an agreement with Turkey meant to stem the flow and reduce the number of people undertaking the short but perilous sea crossing to Greece, where many have died after their overcrowded boats sank. Under the deal, anyone arriving clandestinely on Greek islands from the Turkish coast after March 18 faces deportation back to Turkey unless they successfully apply for asylum in Greece. But few want to request asylum in the country, which has been struggling with a six-year financial crisis that has left unemployment hovering at around 24%. The government has been trying to persuade people staying in Idomeni, who include hundreds of families with young children, to leave the area and head to organised camps. This week it said its campaign of voluntary evacuations was already working, with police reporting that eight buses carrying about 400 people left Idomeni on Sunday. Others took taxis heading to the country's main northern city of Thessaloniki or a nearby town of Polycastro. On the eve of the evacuation operation, few at the camp appeared to welcome the news. Abdo Rajab, a 22-year-old refugee from Raqqa in Syria, has spent the past three months in Idomeni, and is now considering paying smugglers to be taken to Germany clandestinely. "We hear that tomorrow we will all go to camps," he said. "I don't mind, but my aim is not reach the camps but to go Germany."

'We’ve had 40 years of a 40-hour workweek, and now we’re looking at a society with higher sick leaves and early retirement'

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Two people have been killed and 11 wounded by a gunman who fired shots into a small crowd attending an open air concert in Austria before shooting himself dead.

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Police say the overnight shooting near the town of Nenzing, about 24 miles east of the border with Liechtenstein, was preceded by a loud argument between the gunman and a woman in a

nearby car park.