Swiss voters gave a resounding "Yes" today to an agreement extending the right of European Union citizens to live and work in Switzerland, despite fears of immigrant labour and job losses in the deepening recession.
Official results showed 59.6 per cent of voters had backed the deal, renewing an existing agreement allowing migrant workers into Switzerland and extending it to new EU members Bulgaria and Romania. Swiss workers also have access to EU countries.
Opposition to immigrants led to a referendum under Switzerland's popular democracy system challenging government plans to renew the existing accord with the EU that came into force in 2002.
The populist Swiss People's Party (SVP), Switzerland's biggest party, which called for a "No" vote against the government proposal, had conducted an anti-immigrant campaign with posters of three long-beaked sinister-looking ravens picking at a small map of Switzerland.
The SVP was backed by citizens groups in Geneva and Italian-speaking areas who resent the large numbers of people resident across the border in France and Italy who cross the frontier each day to work in Switzerland.
In the event only three small German-speaking cantons and the Italian-speaking canton of Ticino voted against the pact, with the other 22 French and German-speaking cantons in favour.
Reuters