Austrian conservative leader Sebastian Kurz plans to hold coalition talks with the far-right Freedom Party (FPO), he said on Tuesday.

The step would bring the anti-immigration party back into government after more than a decade in opposition.

Kurz's Austrian Peoples Party (OeVP) won last week's parliamentary election with just 31.5 percent of the vote, leaving him well short of a majority and in need of a coalition partner to form a government.

Time to talk: Soon-to-be Austrian Prime Minister Sebastian Kurz, 31, has announced that he will begin coalition talks with the far-right anti-immigrant Freedom Party

Only two parties have enough seats to do that with - the Social Democrats and the FPO - and after meetings with all the other parties in parliament Kurz said today that he had decided to invite the Freedom Party to enter talks on a coalition - a decision that was widely expected.

However, Kurz told a news conference at OeVP headquarters today that a minority government was a 'good Plan B' if those talks failed.

Both Kurz's People's Party and the Freedom Party campaigned on the need for tougher immigration controls, quick deportations of asylum-seekers whose requests are denied and a crackdown on radical Islam.

United: Both Sebastian Kurz and the Freedom Party campaigned for tougher immigration controls, quick deportations of rejected asylum-seekers and a crackdown on radical Islam

Kurz told reporters that his prospective partner, Freedom Party leader Heinz-Christian Strache, had shown 'a will to bring about change in Austria together.'

The 31-year-old Kurz is foreign minister in the outgoing government under Chancellor Christian Kern, a center-left Social Democrat. He is on track to become Europe's youngest leader.

Kurz said he will try to form a government by Christmas. His party finished first in the Oct. 15 election, but no party was close to a parliamentary majority on its own.

He said a 'basic condition' for the new administration is 'a clear pro-European direction.'

'Austria can only be strong if we are not just members of the European Union, but also actively help to strengthen the European Union,' Kurz said. Austria will hold the 28-nation EU's rotating presidency in the second half of next year.