Politico: Babiš may expand Putin’s vanguard in Central Europe

Putin’s vanguard in Central Europe is likely to expand next year, the US website Politico, wrote, noting that this would be a problem for the EU. The website noted that if the former prime minister Andrej Babiš’s ANO party wins the 2025 general elections in Czechia, he will join Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and his Slovak counterpart Robert Fico, in their pro-Russian rhetoric. Politico said that while the billionaire “political chameleon" Babiš is less ideologically rooted than Orbán or Fico, he has tilted his party firmly to the right and is echoing rhetoric by his counterparts in Hungary and Slovakia. Just like Orbán, Babiš says that if Donald Trump were U.S. president there would be no Russian war in Ukraine, and like Fico, the Czech mogul has previously signaled a preference for reducing support for Ukraine as it resists the Kremlin’s full-scale invasion, Politico wrote.