Le Pen – Putin: what relationship? France closer to Moscow if the RN wins the presidential election?

Until the war in Ukraine broke out, Marine Le Pen highlighted her collusion with Vladimir Putin. Since then, it has been difficult, despite the efforts of the far-right candidate for the presidential election, to erase this closeness which is resurfacing from all sides. We recap.

Among the striking images of this week of Marine Le Pen’s campaign is that brandished by an activist from the Ibiza collective: Marine Le Pen and Vladimir Poutine, side by side, in a heart-shaped sign. An irruption during the press conference of the far-right candidate for the 2022 presidential election, short-lived but with strong media resonance. Pauline Rapilly Ferniot, environmental activist and environmental municipal councilor at the town hall of Boulogne-Billancourt, wanted to recall the links of the RN candidate with Vladimir Poutine and to “make visible the fact that Marine Le Pen’s diplomacy was to be complacent with dictators, and to remember that she was a strong partner of Vladimir Putin,” as she explained on RMC.

According to Release, the photo brandished should have appeared on a million Marine Le Pen leaflets, which were thrown in the trash at the start of the war in Ukraine. The photo in question was taken in March 2017, during Marine Le Pen’s campaign for the previous presidential election, before the first round, during her meeting in Moscow with the Russian head of state. Because, if this has not always been the case, Marine Le Pen is now trying to make people forget her links and collusion with Russia.

Marine Le Pen: what diplomatic project with Russia?

Marine Le Pen now speaks of “war crimes” to describe the abuses committed by Russian soldiers in Ukraine, but refuses for the moment to speak of “genocide”. In addition, when Boutcha’s corpses were discovered in Ukraine, the far-right candidate temporized before positioning herself, declaring that it was “up to the UN to say who the culprit is”.

But nuance: on France 2, this Thursday, April 14, Marine Le Pen declared “that Europe would have, in the long term, more to lose if Russia moved away from it and moved closer to China”. And RTL counted: out of the 45 minutes devoted to diplomacy during its press conference on April 13, 2022, Marine Le Pen spoke about Russia for 35 seconds, to mention her wish for a “strategic rapprochement between Russia and the ‘NATO’, once the war in Ukraine was over. On March 31, she already mentioned the possibility that Vladimir Poutine could once again become an “ally” of France, during the program “Elysée 2022” on France 2.

Relations between Marine Le Pen and Vladimir Poutine: campaign financing

“It is mainly questions of funding that have led [Marine Le Pen] to the Kremlin,” said political scientist Bruno Cautrès, quoted by the Dispatch. The daily mentions “a credit of 9.4 million euros granted to the candidate to finance her campaign expenses for the regional and departmental elections of 2014 by the First Czech-Russian Bank, a bank known for its proximity to the Russian secret services .”

In 2017, a Hungarian bank provided funding of around ten million euros for Marine Le Pen’s campaign. A loan facilitated by Marine Le Pen’s relations with Vladimir Poutine, himself close to the Hungarian head of state, Viktor Orban. About ten days ago, the former president of the RN congratulated Viktor Orban for his victory in the legislative elections in his country (“Congratulations to Viktor Orbán for his landslide victory in the legislative elections in Hungary. When the people vote , the people win!, she wrote on Twitter), while he called Ukraine “an adversary”.

Marine Le Pen’s pans over Russia’s annexation of Crimea

Another embarrassment for Marine Le Pen: the mass circulation on social networks of the video of an interview on CNN from February 2017. In it, the far-right candidate claimed that there had been a “coup in Ukraine”, and continued on the subject of the annexation of Crimea by Russia: ” There was no invasion of Crimea, we have to stop! Crimea has always been Russian. It was given to Ukraine not too long ago by the Soviets.” At the time, Marine Le Pen took a position in favor of Russia, considering that the international sanctions taken against the Kremlin were “totally stupid”. At the time, faced with the journalist being surprised that Marine Le Pen, so attached to the national sovereignty of France, sided with Russia when it invaded Crimea, the RN candidate declared that Russia did not represent no danger for Europe.

If until the first round, Eric Zemmour acted as a sort of screen for Marine Le Pen, catalysing a number of criticisms regarding her pro-Russian position, his absence in the second round puts the focus back on Marine Le Pen on this subject. A theme that Emmanuel Macron could turn in his favor during the debate between two rounds.

Reaction of Marine Le Pen to the brutal evacuation of the activist

On the subject of the evacuation of the environmental activist during her press conference on April 13, Marine Le Pen reacted immediately: “We can very well express opposing positions without trying to prevent the democratic expression of the projects of each other.” This Thursday morning on France 2, she said she did not intend to apologize for the evacuation of the activist, pinned to the ground and then dragged out of the room by her security services. According to her, the real problem revealed by this event is that “we can no longer campaign without press conferences being disrupted, without us being threatened and attacked”.

Marine Le Pen said about this criticized evacuation: “These are the police officers of Mr. Darmanin [le ministre de l’intérieur]. You have to contact Mr. Darmanin, I have nothing to do with it.” A lie, since the man who carried out this “evacuation” was a historic member of his security service. On television, the Minister of Interior reacted: “How do you want to be a President of the Republic who says she protects the French if, as soon as there is a problem, she says: “It’s the police”, when in fact it’s not isn’t them?