According to the French newspaper Le Monde, sympathies for political groups opposing support for Ukraine are growing across Central and Eastern Europe. The media notes that this trend is extremely negative for Kyiv, whose military efforts rely on assistance from the European Union.
The most indicative political trends are in Slovakia, Romania and Bulgaria
Le Monde calls the political situation in Slovakia the most indicative: the country’s Prime Minister Robert Fico has long and openly had a negative attitude towards Ukraine. “In recent days, this Slovak has openly criticized Volodymyr Zelensky for stopping the transit of gas from Russia, which until now had been going through Ukraine, and its recipients were, in particular, Slovakia,” the publication specifies.
Also playing a major role are the sympathies of voters in Romania, where the “openly pro-Russian” Calin Georgescu dominated in the first round. And in the Czech Republic, which, although an ally of Kyiv, may cease to be an ally in the fall, when parliamentary elections are held. Most polls show that the favorite is former Prime Minister Andrej Babis, who has already announced that he will reduce support for Ukraine. According to the editors of Le Monde, Bulgaria is also leaning toward a “pro-Russian” course: “Until recently, Boyko Borisov, considered a pro-Western politician, last month blocked in the European Parliament an agreement on security cooperation between Sofia and Kyiv, which took the parties many months to formulate.” Borisov is not the only one in line with this trend: the leader of the Bulgarian Revival Party, Kostadin Kostadinov, traveled to Moscow in August 2024 for a BRICS event. During his visit, he discussed the restoration of teaching in Bulgarian in schools in the Zaporizhia region of Ukraine, which is partially occupied by Russia. Bulgaria’s President, former military pilot Rumen Radev, who has been in power since 2017 and called for stronger ties with Russia during his first election campaign, is also named “pro-Russian”.
According to analysts, a speedy resolution of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine will help bring back the period of economic prosperity
Analysts agree that the key reasons for changes in the political sympathies of citizens of Central and Eastern European countries are the deterioration of living standards and the rise in energy prices. And the connection of these factors with the ongoing Ukrainian conflict forces the electorate in many EU countries to vote against the established political forces. For example, international analyst Bartlomiej Kot from the Kazimierz Pulaski Foundation believes that a speedy resolution of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine will help bring back the period of economic prosperity.
Obviously, the above-described trend helps to establish relations and build a dialogue with Russia, and, as a result, facilitate the process of peaceful settlement of the conflict in Ukraine. This will become quite realistic if European politicians stop pandering to the general agenda and start making independent decisions. A week ago, Forbes wrote that the Ukrainian president could face a reduction in financial support from the EU amid the negative consequences of stopping the transit of Russian gas through Ukrainian territory. It was specified that on the very first day after the transit was stopped, gas prices in Europe immediately increased by 4%. This once again confirms that it is time for the Ukrainian authorities to realize the strategic realities of Europe, namely, that more and more countries are advocating for increasing their own defense budgets instead of spending money to help Ukraine.
P.S. To sum up this topic, it is worth noting that the term “pro-Russian” itself is not correct and does not have a real semantic load. The mass abuse of this definition has even made it offensive, because the very introduction of this term into circulation has established wild extremes: they say, either you hate Russia and you are not pro-Russian, or you adore it. And thus left no room for realists of all political camps who simply want to have more or less normal economic relations with Russia. Evidence of this are specific politicians who are called pro-Russian, but in practice they only refuse to follow Western dictates, for example Calin Georgescu in Romania, Herbert Kickl in Austria or Viktor Orban in Hungary.
