Outrage over Fico’s visit to Putin

The Slovakian Prime Minister Fico triggered harsh criticism in his own country with a visit to Russian President Putin. He justified the meeting with the need to discuss gas supplies.

It was the first official visit by a representative of the Slovak government to Russian President Vladimir Putin since the Russian invasion of Ukraine almost three years ago. Prime Minister Robert Fico visited Putin in the Kremlin on Sunday, sparking outrage in his own country.

It was “a lying theater for his voters,” said the head of the liberal Progressive Slovakia (PS). “In doing so, he is betraying his own country and leading us step by step away from Europe.”

“Robert Fico is a disgrace for Slovakia. He does not behave like a head of government of a sovereign country, but like an ordinary collaborator,” said Branislav Gröhling, head of the smaller liberal opposition party Freedom and Solidarity (SaS). Fico does not speak for the entire Slovak nation, emphasized Gröhling.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky asked in a post on Platform X: “Why is this head of state so dependent on Moscow? What is he paid and how does he pay?”

EU informed about travel

Fico defended his trip in a post on Facebook. He informed the highest representatives of the EU about his upcoming trip on Friday. He did it in response to the impending stop of the transit of Russian gas through Ukraine at the end of the year, which will affect Slovakia as well as Hungary. Putin had confirmed Russia’s willingness to “continue to supply gas to the West and Slovakia,” Fico said afterwards, without specifying how this should take place.

In addition, by demanding sanctions against the Russian nuclear program, Ukraine is endangering electricity generation in Slovakia’s power plants, said Fico. He also discussed the military situation in Ukraine and the possibility of an early peaceful end to the war with Putin.

After the Kremlin meeting, there was no joint press conference and no official statement. Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov did not want to give any precise information about the content, but he mentioned gas deliveries as a possible topic.

No solution for gas deliveries

“The prime minister should discuss gas transit for Slovakia in Kiev,” criticized Michal Simecka, the leader of the largest opposition party. Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavsky said: “The Czech government has sought independence from Russian energy supplies so that we don’t have to grovel before a mass murderer.”

Fico had previously warned that Slovakia was facing a serious crisis because it was completely dependent on Russian gas and had few alternatives. At the EU summit in Brussels at the end of last week, Fico spoke to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky about the problem, which has been known since the summer.

Zelensky explained that while Slovakia only had economic problems, people in his country were dying every day. He had not ruled out that Ukraine would allow the transit of gas from other countries such as Kazakhstan or Azerbaijan, even if it was previously routed through Russian pipelines. In this way, Ukraine would keep a source of income open. But apparently no agreement has yet been reached on this.

Participation in war commemorations announced in May

Since the Russian attack on Ukraine on February 24, 2022, there have been rare visits by European leaders to Putin. Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer was harshly criticized when he met Putin in Moscow a few weeks later, as was the meeting with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban in July 2024.

Fico had already announced at the end of November that he would travel to Moscow next May at Putin’s invitation to commemorate the World War. When he took over as prime minister again in 2023, he rejected further military aid to Kiev.