Trump-Zelensky clash divisions in Europe’s rising far right
Agency :
Donald Trump’s White House confrontation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is exposing differences within Europe’s burgeoning far-right movement over his plan to end the war between Russia and Ukraine.
They celebrated the US president’s return to power for taking a fringe movement mainstream and have backed billionaire Elon Musk’s call to “Make Europe Great Again” (MEGA).
But some on Europe’s far right are torn about Trump’s dressing-down of Zelensky and his seeming indifference to the perceived threat Russian President Vladimir Putin poses to democratic Europe.
Trump on Monday froze critical US military aid for Ukraine against Russia’s three-year-old invasion following an explosive public confrontation in the Oval Office last week over a peace plan with Zelensky, who infuriated Trump by insisting the US should provide security guarantees as part of any ceasefire.
A handful of Europe’s far-right figures including Hungary’s Viktor Orban, Germany’s Tino Chrupalla and Italy’s Matteo Salvini have backed Trump emphatically.
Other right-leaning politicians such as Britain’s Nigel Farage and Poland’s Krzysztof Bosak couched their support with caveats or were openly critical of Trump’s cold-shouldering of Europe and Ukraine while suggesting Kyiv would have to cede territory for peace but demanding no concessions from the Kremlin.
The divergence shows how right-wing populists are far from a cohesive group, curbing their sway in European Union politics and underlining the limits of Musk’s effort to rally the region around his MEGA campaign to promote the anti-EU far right.
“There is a combination of factors that don’t necessarily spur open confrontation with Trump as with the left, but still lead to distance between him and … far-right parties that increasingly accept European integration,” said Alexander Clarkson, lecturer in European studies at King’s College London.