From an office in Prague, the online portal “Voice of Europe” is said to have maintained contacts across Europe – all the way to the EU Parliament. And it is said to have paid money to politicians, including members of the AfD.
The lobby network “Voice of Europe” is based directly in the city center of Prague, near Wenceslas Square. A year ago in March, a Polish citizen registered there in the Czech commercial register, explains journalist Vojtech Berger from the independent investigative portal “Hlidaci pes”.
“It wasn’t just a virtual office at this address. There was actually a proper office there and I rang the doorbell last September,” said Berger. To his great surprise, someone opened it too. “It was a young woman who was perhaps a bit surprised that I started speaking in English. She stopped that pretty soon and called someone called Seryozha in Russian.”
From this Prague office, the pro-Russian propaganda server is said to have maintained contacts across Europe – even to the EU Parliament. The portal was also active on social media and available in German. The goal: to discredit Ukraine and influence the European elections. This was revealed by the Czech secret service BIS.
Portal was intended to discredit Ukraine
The Czech government then put the operators of the “Voice of Europe” website on its sanctions list against Russia, according to Prime Minister Petr Fiala. “We have decided to intervene in a pro-Russian network that has tried to operate from our territory, with serious implications for the security of the Czech Republic and the European Union.”
According to Fiala, the goal of the influential group was to endanger Ukraine’s territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence. These attempts are carefully documented – the evidence file comprises 300 pages.
Two Ukrainian businessmen and politicians with close ties to Russia are now on the Czech sanctions list: Artyom Marchevsky and Viktor Medvedchuk. The latter is accused of high treason in Ukraine – as part of a prisoner exchange, Medvedchuk was apparently able to leave the country and travel to Moscow. The oligarch is considered a confidant of Russian President Vladimir Putin. He has allegedly been paid to represent Russian interests for years. He is also known as the “Prince of Darkness”.
“Voice of Europe” paid money to European politicians
The Czech daily “Denik N” reports that the pro-Russian portal “Voice of Europe” has published statements from politicians calling on the EU to stop its aid to Ukraine. The news site paid some politicians for this with Russian money – according to Czech research, in some cases this also covered costs for the European election campaign.
Politicians from six countries are said to have received payments: Belgium, France, Hungary, the Netherlands, Poland – and Germany. The Czech journalists write that cash was handed over in Prague to, as they say, “anti-system politicians” from Germany. They rely on the Czech secret service.
He does not name names, but according to media reports, he shared his findings with other European secret services. It is known that this pro-Russian propaganda portal has published interviews in the past with Maximilian Krah, the AfD’s top candidate for the European elections, as well as with the second on the AfD list, Petr Bystron. The member of the Bundestag comes from what is now the Czech Republic.
Portal relied on right-wing extremist and AfD-affiliated sources
The journalist Berger has also been researching “Voice of Europe” connections to Germany for months. “In addition to the interviews with the AfD politicians, but also with many other politicians, the so-called right-wing or right-wing populist alliance, it quickly became clear that this website specifically relies on sources that are considered to be proven right-wing extremist in Germany, for example, or clearly are close to the AfD.”
According to Berger, the Compact magazine, the Deutschland-Kurier and the “Our Central Europe” network were cited. “Voice of Europe” brought together, translated and distributed all of these portals. Czech Prime Minister Fiala emphasizes that his government has never shut down websites and will not do so this time either.
But the state will enforce the sanctions. This means freezing accounts and company shares and enforcing residence bans. The “Voice of Europe” website has no longer been online since Wednesday evening.
Marianne Allweiss, ARD Prague, tagesschau, March 28, 2024 2:06 p.m