Yuriy Ukazkin
The Kremlin’s optimism seems to be fading away. The thing is that the amount of pro-Russian politicians in Europe capable of influencing the European politics is shrinking slowly but surely.
International observers say that many political experts in Russia and Europe expected the pro-Russian forces to win the parliamentary election in Bulgaria. But eventually, the results turned out to be the opposite. Many Russian editions start spreading the rumors that Bulgaria is about to turn their back on Russia in favor of a tighter integration with the NATO.
As for the losing parties, they showed their loyalty to Russia but somehow failed to show the public their efficient strategies of cooperating with both Russia and the European Union. The list of the new Bulgarian parliamentarians is expected to be published on early April. However, the overall results of the parliamentary election are already known.
Pro-Russian Position – Black Mark for European Politicians
The party called “ГЕРБ” (Emblem) won the election with 32,66% of votes. The Socialists who counted on victory, eventually got only 27,19% of votes. The opposing coalition named “United Patriots” got 9% of votes. The remaining 2 parties that got seats in the Bulgarian parliament are “The Movement for the Rights and Freedoms” and “Will”.
As for another political power called “Democrats for Responsibility, Freedom and Tolerance” failed to get seats in the parliament. The party had found themselves amid a scandal the essence of which was the allegations that the party had been sponsored by Turkey.
Some Turkish ministers also promoted a Dutch political force loyal to Turkey among the Turks living in the Netherlands, which is why those ministers were recognized persona non grata in the Netherlands. By the way they did the same in Bulgaria, but the local citizen changed their mind after the Turks started openly promoting the mentioned Bulgarian party to lobby their interests.
The bottom line is, the preliminary results of the parliamentary election in Bulgaria showed that the external forces start failing to influence the political life in some European countries. Bulgarian socialists favor Russia, Turkey failed to raise their loyal party in Bulgaria. Anyway, in both cases, neither Russia, nor Turkey have made any significant impact on the political live in this Balkan state. As for France, Marine Le Pen keeps on losing her rating even after visiting Moscow. The amount of influential pro-Russian politicians from Europe is likely to shrink in the coming months.
Yuriy Ukazkin
