Bulgarian pro-Putin party joins EU far right group after Moscow visit

Far-right pro-Russian party Vazrazhdane has joined the far-right Identity and Democracy group in the European Parliament, deputies from the Eurosceptic Bulgarian party announced on Wednesday after visiting Moscow at the invitation of Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party.

In Bulgaria, Vazrazhdane is the third-largest political force in the national parliament, which gives them the potential to have up to four out of a total of 17 Bulgarian MEPs in the European Parliament – which would undoubtedly help ID, currently the sixth largest group in the EU Parliament with 59 members.

According to the latest EU elections projections, the ID group is estimated to rank third, winning 92 seats in the new EU House.

“Perhaps you already know that we are part of Identity and Democracy, and the goal of our political organisation is to achieve such a result in the upcoming parliamentary elections that we get as many representatives as possible into the European Parliament,” Vazrazhdane MP Kosta Stoyanov said about joining the far-right party which includes Le Pen’s Rassemblement National, Matteo Salvini’s Lega and Alice Weidel’s Alternative for Germany (AfD).

The trip to Russia

Commenting on Vazrazhdane’s trip to Russia, MP Kosta Stoyanov said that his party had received invitations to participate in many events and had attended events in 12 countries over the past six months.

Regarding the trip to Moscow, the party said it received an invitation from Putin’s party to participate in the forum “For the Freedom of Nations” in Moscow last month.

“From the European Union, only we from Bulgaria participated; only we were the representatives from Vazrazhdane,” said Stoyanov, adding that the forum was held in Moscow and was hosted by Deputy Chairman of the Security Council Dmitry Medvedev and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

The forum “For the Freedom of Nations” discussed the struggle against modern forms of neo-colonialism, Stoyanov said, as quoted by state news agency BTA.

He added that he was formally the head of the delegation, as he is the head of the parliamentary dimension of the Central European Initiative in the Bulgarian Parliament. Bulgarian MPs from Vazrazhdane, Angel Georgiev and Ivelin Parvanov, travelled with him.

The deputies from Vazrazhdane say they had a “quite positive conversation” with Russian representatives.

“We talked about the future relations between Bulgaria and Russia because we are an organisation that wants to build bridges, not destroy them,” Stoyanov said.

A few months after the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Vazrazhdane leader Kostadin Kostadinov tried to visit Ukraine but was expelled by the Ukrainian authorities. After returning to Bulgaria, he said that he had been banned from visiting Ukraine for 10 years because the Bulgarian special services had reported to Kyiv that he was a Russian spy.

Pro-EU forces react

Criticism of Vazrazhdane came from MPs from the pro-European PP-DB coalition, which is part of the Bulgarian government, who demanded that Vazrazhdane’s MPs be barred from participating in parliamentary committees because she visited the Moscow Diplomatic Institute.

“There is no way Bulgarian MPs should be at the recruitment centre for (spies) in Moscow on a visit,” PP-DB MP Nastimir Ananiev commented.

Ivaylo Mirchev of the PP-DB raised the issue of access to classified information, such as that enjoyed by MPs on the parliamentary defence committee.

“There is extremely sensitive data about what we are sending to Ukraine and about Bulgaria’s armaments,” Mirchev said, recalling that the Russian Federation had declared Bulgaria an enemy state.

“Just think what data could be transferred there,” he commented.

(Krassen Nikolov | Euractiv.bg)