Russia Accused of Bribing Members of the European Parliament

Czechia said on Wednesday that its intelligence service discovered the network spread Russian propaganda through the news site Voice of Europe, which has been based in Prague for some time. Originally, Voice of Europe is a Dutch website with a far-right political direction.

Moscow paid money to members of the European Parliament to promote Russian propaganda, said Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo on Thursday. Russia’s attempts to exert Moscow-friendly influence within EU circles have long been a matter of growing concern and reservations within the EU.

The investigation focuses on Voice of Europe, a Dutch publicly listed company which is said to have recently been sold. The company describes itself as providing “uncensored news from Europe and the world.” Two weeks ago, it organized a debate in Strasbourg attended by members of Spain’s Vox party and the far-right Forum for Democracy in the Netherlands. The company’s website has been offline since Wednesday evening.

A Brussels spokesperson added that the parliament already bans access to EU buildings for media listed on EU sanctions lists. One of the sanctioned individuals is the pro-Kremlin Ukrainian politician Viktor Medvedchuk, who had used the Voice of Europe website to spread propaganda opposing the “territorial integrity, sovereignty, and independence” of Ukraine. 

Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala stated that the uncovered operation aimed to destabilize all of Europe and revealed that other European countries have since launched their own investigations. The Polish Internal Security Agency said on Thursday that it also conducted raids in Warsaw and the city of Tychy as part of a joint inquiry.

Reports of Russian bribery of EU politicians in Strasbourg are emerging just three months before the European elections in June. Since December 2022, the European Parliament has been shaken by the so-called Qatargate scandal, involving suspicions of corruption linked to Qatar and Morocco.