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Belgian and French authorities have raided the offices of a European parliament staffer on suspicion of working for Russia, the latest in a series of scandals involving far-right lawmakers and their alleged ties to foreign governments.
Police on Wednesday raided the apartment and parliamentary offices in Brussels and Strasbourg of an assistant in the European parliament, according to Belgian officials. The staffer is being investigated in connection with an alleged Russian influence operation run via the Prague-based Voice of Europe website, which has been banned from broadcasting in the EU.
“The searches are part of a case of interference, passive corruption and membership of a criminal organisation and relates to indications of Russian interference, whereby members of the European parliament were approached and paid to promote Russian propaganda via the Voice of Europe ‘news website’,” the Belgian prosecutor’s office said.
The prosecutor added there were “indications that the European parliament employee concerned played a significant role in this”.
Belgian officials confirmed that the staffer was employed by Dutch MEP Marcel de Graaff, of the far-right Dutch Forum for Democracy. De Graaff and his assistant could not immediately be reached for comment.
Czech authorities in March banned Voice of Europe and imposed sanctions on pro-Kremlin Ukrainian oligarch Viktor Medvedchuk, who they said was running the operation and using the website to pay politicians to peddle pro-Russian propaganda ahead of the European parliament elections in June.
Medvedchuk lives in Moscow after having been swapped for Ukrainian war prisoners. He has not commented on the allegations. Voice of Europe has denied being a Russian propaganda outlet.
Several other European countries including France, the Netherlands, Germany, Poland and Belgium have also opened investigations.
The raids on Thursday constitute the first searches being carried out in Belgium in the context of the case.
De Graaf has made multiple pro-Russia statements. In March he told parliament that “reports about the deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia are pure propaganda”.
He alleged that Ukraine had committed war crimes and was “the largest supplier of children for paedophile networks, human smuggling and organ trafficking”.
A spokesperson for the European parliament said it “fully co-operates with law enforcement and judicial authorities to assist the course of justice and will continue to do so”.
Additional reporting by Daria Mosolova in Brussels
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