Europe’s far-right in a quagmire

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has plunged far-right movements across Europe into an identity crisis, as they struggle to square their loyalty to Vladimir Putin with the public’s overwhelming solidarity with Kyiv.

From Germany to France to Italy, extremist groups have condemned the assault, but some have in the same breath championed President Putin’s line of blaming the West for triggering the conflict in the first place.

“When someone attacks, it is clear that we must be on the side of the one that was attacked,” said Matteo Salvini of Italy’s far-right Northern League, who has in the past openly declared his admiration for Putin.

France’s Marine Le Pen has also joined the chorus of condemnation of Russia violating international law.

Openly denouncing the violence in Ukraine is in sync with the rest of the political spectrum and, most important, in line with pro-Ukrainian public opinion, said Hajo Funke, political scientist at the Free University of Berlin. But that’s where the similarities end.

When it comes to an analysis of the responsibilities of the war, far-right parties appear to be singing from Putin’s hymn sheet.

Nato to blame?

Alice Weidel, head of Germany’s far-right AfD party, has denounced the “historical failure” of the West, accusing it of offering Ukraine a perspective of joining Nato rather than pushing for the country to be a neutral buffer nation between the alliance and Russia.

Likewise, Eric Zemmour, another far-right candidate in France’s presidential elections in April, charged that while “Putin is the guilty one, those responsible are in Nato which has not stopped expanding”.

Zemmour had in 2018 said he wished there could be a “French Putin” in France.

The parties are aligned with “the Russian position that the conflict should not be attributed exclusively to Vladimir Putin but rather to a great extent to the West”, Wolfgang Schroeder of the University of Kassel told AFP.

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