Watch HERE the video of a very informative one-hour meeting at the European Parliament
“Russia is instrumentalizing the clergy of some Orthodox Churches in the EU neighbourhood to destabilize countries which are candidates to EU membership, especially on the eve of elections,” said two experts invited by the Special Committee on the European Democracy Shield at the European Parliament in Brussels on Monday 21 September.
The first keynote speaker was Prof.Thorniké Gordadze, a Franco-Georgian academic from the Jacques Delors Institute. He covered the issue in Georgia and Armenia. The next one was Prof. Lucian Leustean Lucian Leustean, a Reader in Politics and International Relations at Aston University where he has been teaching since 2007. He spoke about Putin’s concept of spiritual security and the influence of pro-Russian clerics in Ukraine and Serbia, two candidates for EU membership, as well as two EU member states, Romania and Bulgaria.
French MEP Nathalie Loiseau (France/ Renew Political Group)
The meeting was opened by the chair of the Special Committee, French MEP Nathalie Loiseau (France/ Renew Political Group) who started with a quote of President of Moldova, Maia Sandu, saying at the last plenary session of the EU Parliament “The intervention did not start and end on the day of the election. This is a permanent effort dividing us over the long term, like a virus looking for weak points in our organisms.”
Moldova: Online pro-Russian disinformation discrediting pro-European government
A week before the upcoming the parliamentary elections on 28 September, the authorities carried out 250 raids and detained dozens of people as part of an investigation into an alleged Russia-backed plan to incite “mass riots” and destabilise the country in the run-up to critical parliamentary elections.
The raids targeted more than 100 people and took place in multiple localities across the country, police said. Seventy-four people were detained for up to 72 hours.
In the Russian propaganda conveyed by Russia through Orthodox clerics, MEP Loiseau pointed at a gross fake news saying that if Moldova joins the EU, the EU will destroy the Orthodox churches.
In 2024, more than three hundred Moldovan priests went on a “pilgrimage” to Moscow, with all their expenses covered. The priests then travelled with their wives and parishioners in three groups over oever 100 people each in August and September.
“These were luxury trips with financial incentives to try to influence the referendum on EU membership,” MEP Loiseau commented.
Questions and reactions of some MEPs
MEP Tomas Zdechovsky (Czechia/EPP)
Tomas Zdechovsky (Czechia/EPP)
“In the Czech Republic, we also have interferences of the Russian Orthodox Church in Karlovy Vary, Prague and other cities. We have tried to put an end to such unwelcome influence through the Orthodox Church of Karlovy Vary with our own Magnitsky law but this year they quickly transferred the ownership of their assets to Hungary to avoid their confiscation.”
“It is becessary to say openly that the intrusions of Russia in our internal affairs are the work of the FSB (Russian Federal Securtity Service) and the GRU (Foreign Military Intelligence) and we are really stupid not to recognize that Russia misuses the Orthodox Church in his hybrid war.”
“Putin goes to church, not because he is a religious person, but because he wants to have the clergy on his side in his war on Ukraine. My conclusion is that we have to stop the Russian infiltration in our society”
Vasile Dincu (Romania/S&D)
MEP Dincu insisted on the importance of the upcoming elections in Moldova, a crucial and decisive battleground. As a sociologist, he said that the Orthodox Church is by nature conservative and fits very well with Russian propaganda. In Eastern countries, Orthodox Churches are trusted by 70-80% of the population, he said, and Putin capitalizes on this.
The Republic of Moldova is in great danger today, he insisted, saying that there are two main Orthodox Churches and the main one is linked to Moscow.
MEP Helmut Brandstätter (Austria/ Renew)
Helmut Brandstätter (Austria/ Renew)
“My question is about the Russian concept of ‘Holy War.’ How do people feel in Moldova and Georgia about a church which talks about a holy war?”
And he asked his colleague V. Dincu to what extent they agree to this concept in each of the countries mentioned during the debate: Moldova, Georgia and Russia. He also questioned the attitude of the Russian Orthodox Church which praised the re-education and russification of the thousands of Ukrainian children forcefully sent to Russia.
”It is a genocide. The Russians killed Ukrainian children and they do not want to have any more Ukrainian children on their soil. They want to make Russians of them,” he added. His final proposal was to investigate the activities of the Orthodox priests in the EU and to deport them if they spy for Russia.
Alexandra Geese (Germany/ Greens)
She asked questions about the creation of an autonomous Orthodox Church by Ukraine, the relations between the conservative American Evangelical churches and conservative Orthodox churches, the position of the EU concerning the political role played by Orthodox Churches in a number of its member states.
P. Volgin (Bulgaria/ Europe of Sovereign Nations)
He was the voice of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) formerly closely linked to the Russian Orthodox Church and under threat of sanctions by the Ukrainian government despite the revision of their bylaws and their distancing from Moscow. He also voiced the complains of the UOC saying they were persecuted by the government and the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU).
Other MEPs raised questions. They can be watched in the video of the meeting. Watch more HERE
