A Putin in the heart of Europe?

Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s declaration in summer 2014 that his government was going “to build an illiberal nation state” was far from a revelation. Rather, it was a statement of a long-acknowledged fact: Orbán’s Hungary is increasingly becoming a right-wing authoritarian kleptocracy bearing a growing resemblance to Vladimir Putin’s Russia.

The pro-Putin United Russia party formed its first parliamentary majority after the 2003 elections. Putin took this opportunity to modify the electoral law to marginalise minor parties in the next elections and strengthen the major parties and, in particular, the United Russia. These changes helped the United Russia to win enough seats in the 2007 parliamentary elections to form a constitutional majority. Since Orbán’s party Fidesz returned to power after the 2010 parliamentary elections, he has moved swiftly to consolidate it. Amid the popular disappointment with the previous, Socialist-led government that failed to effectively tackle the 2008 financial crisis, Fidesz and its minor coalition partner Christian Democratic People’s Party secured two-thirds of the seats in the parliament. Forming a parliamentary majority allowed them to modify the country’s constitution, including the electoral law, in 2012. The electoral reform helped Orbán retain the constitutional majority after the 2014 elections.

Viktor Orbán and Vladimir Putin

Center for Eurasian Strategic Intelligence, a fraudulent "hawkish" think tank

Readers of this blog may have heard of the Center for Eurasian Strategic Intelligence (CESI) that seems to promote a "hawkish" view on Russia's foreign policy. In his Twitter, Edward Lucas has recently raised doubts about the authenticity of this organisation, and, as I found out, for a good reason. Let's have a closer look at CESI.

(Note that I will not be discussing their analyses, as they tend to plagiarise from other sources.)

Major resources of CESI:
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/eurasianintelligence. Registered on 18 March 2014.
- Website: http://eurasianintelligence.org. Registered on 18 July 2014.
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/eurasianintelligence/ Registered on 6 August 2014.
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/EurasianIntel. Date of registration unknown, first tweet on 12 August 2014.

How cronyism exploits Ukrainian neo-Nazis

Ukraine’s early presidential and parliamentary elections earlier this year proved to be disastrous for the Ukrainian party-political far right.

Oleh Tyahnybok, the leader of the All-Ukrainian Union “Freedom” (Svoboda), obtained 1.16% of the vote in the presidential election, while his party secured only 4.71% of the vote in the parliamentary election and, eventually, failed to pass the 5% electoral threshold and enter the parliament. In comparison, Svoboda obtained 10.44% of the votes in 2012 and formed the first ever far right parliamentary group in Ukraine’s history. Dmytro Yarosh, the leader of the Right Sector, obtained 0.70% in the presidential election, and 1.80% of the voters supported his party in the parliamentary election.

However, the electoral failure of Svoboda and the Right Sector did not mark “the end of history” of the Ukrainian far right, and some other developments proved to be much more problematic. One of these developments is the rise of the previously obscure neo-Nazi organisation “Patriot of Ukraine” (PU) led by Andriy Bilets’ky.

Neo-Nazi leader Andriy Bilets'ky. Kharkiv, several years ago

Russian fascist Aleksandr Dugin gathering intelligence on the French military

A report written by Russian fascist Aleksandr Dugin on 17 December 2013 (and published by the Anonymous International) suggests that he has been trying to gather intelligence on the French military circles.

In his report, Dugin describes a closed meeting of the French association "Civisme Défense Armée Nation" (Citizenship, Defense, Army, Nation, CiDAN) that took place at the Klingenthal castle near Strasbourg on 2-5 December 2013. CiDAN was established in 1999 by Admiral Pierre Lacoste, and, as they describe themselves, the association is guided by the "modern vision of patriotism and Europe", and promotes "devotion to the community" and contacts between civil society and the military. Its leadership largely consists of retired or reserve officers, and its president is Lieutenant Colonel Jacques Sonnet.

The French far right secure a €9m loan from a Russian bank close to Putin

Writing for Mediapart, Marine Turchi reveals that the far right French Front National (FN) has secured, already in September this year, a 9 million Euros loan from the First Czech-Russian Bank (FCRB). The party led by Marine Le Pen has already received 2 million Euros. The information on the loan to the FN, according to Mediapart, has been confirmed by a member of the FN's political bureau. This development supports my earlier argument that "European right-wing extremists seem to benefit financially from their cooperation with the Kremlin".

As the FN's treasurer Wallerand de Saint-Just explained, the party had been trying to borrow money from a number of French, European and US banks, but was unsuccessful. Eventually, the FCRB proved to be more sympathetic to the French far right cause. "Why not a Russian bank?", asked Christian Bouchet, FN's officer in Loire-Atlantique, French publisher of Russian fascist Aleksandr Dugin and former leader of the National Bolshevik Nouvelle résistance group. "Money does not stink", he added, referring to Roman Emperor Vespasian's justification for a tax on the distribution of urine from public urinals in Rome.

Russians involved in the fake elections in eastern Ukraine

According to the article "Ukraine Tensions Rise as U.S., EU Weigh More Sanctions" that was published by Bloomberg on 13 November 2014, officials from the EU and U.S. meeting in Brussels "will weigh further sanctions against Russia’s economy and Ukrainian separatists, after the reported movement of tanks, artillery and combat troops into eastern Ukraine".

Moreover, "the likeliest first step, they said, is to blacklist Ukrainian separatists and Russians involved in the Nov. 2 elections in eastern regions, which the Ukrainian government considers illegitimate".

I have already posted the list of "election monitors" that travelled to Eastern Ukraine (illegally) and to neighbouring Russian regions to "observe" fake elections for the "Donetsk People's Republic" and "Luhansk People's Republic". The list, to which I refer, is not complete, but this is the most complete list of fake "observers" available today. In this post, I will provide more information on the Russians who were involved in organising the "observation mission" in the Donbass and participated in it.

Who organised the "observation mission"?

From the Russian side, the main group that was involved in organising the "observation mission" is the Moscow-based "Civic Control" Association. "Civic Control" is what can be called a "GONGO", i.e. a "government organised non-governmental organisation", as the groups that compose this association are loyal to the Kremlin, while the key figures in the management of the association are members of – or, at least, closely associated with – the Russian parliament and the Civic Chamber of the Russian Federation.

The co-chair of the "Civic Control", who was directly involved in organising the "observation mission", is Aleksandr Brod, director of the "Moscow Bureau for Human Rights". He also participated in the "observation mission" himself.

Aleksandr Semyonovich Brod (Александр Семенович Брод), born on 19 August 1969.

Russian extreme right White Rex organisation engaged in training of British neo-Nazi thugs

In a revealing article for The Daily Star, Scott Hesketh and Colin Cortbus write about training camps in Wales where neo-Nazi thugs "are being drilled in unarmed combat and fighting using knives and assault rifles". According to the authors, anti-terror police are monitoring the activities of the training camps which - under the leadership of fitness instructor and author Craig Fraser - might be used "to prepare for a wave of anti-Muslim and anti-Semitic attacks".

Moreover, the authors mention that neo-Nazi thugs were "also put through fitness ­sessions by trainers from ­Russian neo-Nazi group White Rex". Since there is not much information on White Rex available in English language, I decided to "introduce" the Anglophone audience to this movement. (I am grateful to the Moscow-based Sova Centre for Information and Analysis, the most important Russian NGO that conducts research on ultranationalism, racism and political radicalism in Russia, for the information they have provided).