SLAPP Cases – Constraining Media Freedom and Freedom of Speech in Balkans, EU, UK, Australia

SLAPP: Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation, is another tactic used by wealthy oligarchs and the powerful to avoid being held to account, stymying freedom of speech, burying inconvenient truths and bankrupting defendants. 

This phenomenon has become especially apparent in the UK with both local and/or non resident plaintiffs using libel actions for public criticism, Australia by conservative Ministers also & the Balkans against NGOs and civil society.

Following are three articles of past year explaining the impact and solutions in Balkan Insight’s ‘SLAPP Cases Targeting Many Public Actors Besides Journalist – Report’, ByLine Times ‘ON TRIAL Freedom of the Press’ and Open Democracy UK in ‘The UK’s reputation management industry is destroying journalism. It must be stopped’.

Very clear that the powers that be in many constituencies or nations have a strong interest in avoiding transparency and empowered media to inform society?

From Balkan Insight: ‘SLAPP Cases Targeting Many Public Actors Besides Journalists – Report

Matea Grgurinovic Zagreb BIRN March 17, 2022

New report by Coalition against SLAPPs in Europe shows that these lawsuits are being used to silence not only journalists but activists, civil society organizations and academics.

A new report by the Coalition Against SLAPPs in Europe, CASE, “Shutting Out Criticism: How SLAPPs Threaten European Democracy”, published on Wednesday, says although journalists are most likely targets, these lawsuits also target activists, human rights defenders and academics.

“Journalists are targeted with SLAPPs because they bring information to light while activists, civil society organisations, and academics are confronted with SLAPPs because they challenge the status quo,” the report says.

Its data also show that the number of so-called Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation in Europe is growing, and that claimants are “becoming increasingly creative”.

The report recalls the example of Elitech against Friends of the Earth, FoE, Croatia and the civic initiative, Srdj je nas (“Srdj is ours”).

In 2013, the citizens’ initiative, together with the Croatian Architects Association, requested the Constitutional Court to assess the legality of the construction of a luxury resort and golf course on Srđ hill by the multinational manufacturing company Elitech. FoE Croatia placed a billboard criticising the project in a public place.

“FoE Croatia subsequently faced two different lawsuits: civil defamation against the organisation, with a request for a gagging order; and the president and two vice-presidents of FoE Croatia were criminally prosecuted for libel,” the report recalls, adding that this case “shows how SLAPPs are used as a means of silencing those speaking out about a shared concern”.

The report stresses the “chilling effect” that SLAPPs have, meaning the financial burden, the time defendants have to take to prepare their legal defence, the effort to remember details of events that often took place years previously, as well as the mental and emotional toll.

“Many described the process of dealing with the SLAPP as more taxing and intimidating than actually receiving the legal threat,” the report adds……

…..Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation are civil claims filed against individuals or organisations. Businesses and government officials often file them against those that oppose them on issues of public concern, with a view to silencing them. They are widely seen as a tool of “modern censorship”.

A SLAPP can be based on a range of legal theories, including defamation, data protection, privacy, business torts and data protection, and often exploit gaps in procedural protections that are often highly specific to the jurisdiction in question.’

From ByLine Times: ‘ON TRIAL Freedom of the Press 

Manasa Narayanan and Daisy Steinhardt

14 February 2022

Focusing on the current cases against journalists Carole Cadwalladr and Tom Burgis, Manasa Narayanan and Daisy Steinhardt explore how libel laws allow the rich and powerful to silence journalism.

Journalism and the justice system are currently intertwined, with two major defamation cases in progress – one against investigative journalist Carole Cadwalladr; and another against Tom Burgis, investigations correspondent for the Financial Times. There is also the extradition case of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

The two defamation claims are particularly significant because of their implications for ‘SLAPP’ (Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation) cases and public interest journalism in the UK.

SLAPP are essentially a form of legal harassment, whereby certain laws and judicial frameworks are exploited by rich and/or politically well-connected individuals and organisations to the detriment of their critics – usually journalists, activists and NGO workers.

One of the main vehicles of SLAPP is defamation – also called libel – which is a charge accusing someone of writing something false in a way that harms a person’s public image and causes ‘serious harm’ to their reputation. In effect, political and economic elites can use highly expensive and time-consuming defamation suits against their critics – effectively silencing them. 

Cadwalladr was slapped with a libel case by the millionaire businessman Arron Banks in 2019. As of 2018, estimates of his wealth ranged from £100 million to £250 million. Aside from being wealthy, Banks has also been involved in British politics in recent years. As one of the founders of the Leave.EU referendum campaign, he played a pivotal role in the 2016 leave vote and is known for his close links to Nigel Farage.

While Cadwalladr has, over the years, written several pieces about Banks and the Brexit Referendum – with a particular focus on the Leave campaigns – it was a TED talk, during which she made a passing remark about Banks’ “covert relationship with the Russian Government” and an accompanying tweet about the talk that has been the subject of this costly legal suit.

Meanwhile, Burgis faces two lawsuits brought by the Kazakh mining company, Eurasian Natural Resources Corporation (ENRC). In both his reporting and his book, Kleptopia, Burgis talks about kleptocracy – a term used to describe a system in which autocratic states, such as Kazakhstan, use their power and links in places such as London to safeguard their wealth. This is the context in which Burgis reported on the ENRC and now faces libel charges – one against him and his book publisher HarperCollins, and another against him and the Financial Times. 

Both of these cases have raised serious concerns about press freedom. 

When Cadwalladr’s case went to court last month, 19 organisations, including Reporters Without Borders, declared their support for her – publicly calling Banks’ legal pursuit a SLAPP suit, and reiterating that it was “aimed at intimidating and silencing Cadwalladr” for her journalism. 

In Burgis’ case, 15 such organisations released a joint statement to “condemn lawsuits brought by ENRC” against him, HarperCollins and the Financial Times.

Cadwalladr’s case is particularly striking given that, despite writing extensively about Banks and the leave campaign for years for major newspapers, and having made the supposedly defamatory claim in a TED talk, she has been targeted as an individual – leaving her with no institutional support.

Indeed, even though Cadwalladr made claims similar to those made in the TED talk in the Observer newspaper in 2018, Banks did not sue her on that basis. The Observer article had undergone a vetting process by an editorial team, while the production of the TED talk saw the involvement of its own team. Yet, Cadwalladr has been singled out and pursued relentlessly as an individual.

Other organisations, including Channel 4 and the BBC, have conducted extensive investigations into Arron Banks, but do not figure in his fight against disrepute. 

One of the defining characteristics of a SLAPP is the stark disparity between the economic and political capital of the claimant and the defendant. This can be seen when comparing Banks to Cadwalladr. While Banks has vast resources to launch a defamation suit, Cadwalladr has been forced to crowdfund her legal costs and is likely to have to declare bankruptcy if she loses.

While the powerful do not have much to lose, for journalists like Carole Cadwalladr and Tom Burgis this is not just about money – their careers and livelihoods are on the line.

Even if they win their respective cases, the innumerable court trips and legal meetings will have drained them both financially and emotionally, preventing them from carrying out their work as they otherwise would.

The ENRC has launched a total of 18 legal proceedings against journalists, lawyers and other critics since 2013, including one against the Serious Fraud Office.’ 

From Open Democracy UK: ‘The UK’s reputation management industry is destroying journalism. It must be stopped

Protecting media freedom and tackling corruption are intrinsically linked. The UK needs to address both to achieve either effectively

Susan Coughtrie 19 July 2021, 7.33am

This month, British newspapers reported that an Azerbaijani millionaire DJ, Mikaela Jav, and her husband, Suleyman Javadov, had been forced to forfeit £4 million to the National Crime Agency, after admitting the funds had entered the UK illegally through a complex money laundering system known as the ‘Azerbaijan Laundromat’.

Pictures of the Javadovs’ lavish lifestyle, including four multi-million pound properties in London, ran alongside commentary pointing out that the NCA actually reclaimed £10 million less than was originally under question…..

…..However, the fact that a media outlet had to pursue an expensive, two-year legal battle in order to prevent what the judge in the case ruled would have been a “disproportionate interference with the principle of open justice” should spark some alarming questions for those involved in media freedom, transparency and anti-corruption efforts in the UK.

Indeed, this case intersects with a much larger, more troubling story – how the UK’s financial and legal systems not only service at best ‘questionable’ money flows originating from countries with less-than-stellar democratic records, but that the country is also home to legal and reputation laundering services that can be utilised to suppress public scrutiny into, or whitewash over, potential wrongdoing…..

…..If the UK government wants to deliver on its commitments to protect media freedom – both at an international level, through its leadership of the Global Media Freedom Coalition, and domestically, having established the National Committee on the Safety of Journalists – then it must also fully examine how illicit finance and corruption feeds into violations against media freedom, both here and abroad.

Despite the UK parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee’s damning findings in its July 2020 Russia Report, regarding the existence of a ‘London Laundromat’, supported by a “growth industry of enablers”, the UK appears to be backsliding on anti-corruption commitments. This is in contrast to the US, where President Biden’s administration has made a pointed shift to address corruption as a core national security interest….

This type of ‘positive’ reputation management comes alongside a far more insidious issue: attempts to remove ‘uncomfortable information’ from the public domain or prevent it from getting there in the first place. The case against Radu is part of a growing body of evidence pointing to the use of legal intimidation and SLAPPs (strategic lawsuits against public participation). A term originally devised in the US, SLAPPs are legal actions taken against journalists, as well as whistleblowers, activists or others speaking out in the public interest.

Thus, lawyers can easily threaten legal action on behalf of super-wealthy clients. But journalists, especially freelancers or small media outlets, find it difficult to mount the financial resources and legal expertise to respond. The reputation managers’ goal is not necessarily to win in court, but rather to intimidate, to consume the financial and psychological resources of the target, so they simply give up. If successful, they can create an information vacuum about the initial subject matter as well as the fact a legal challenge took place.

In a survey of 63 investigative journalists reporting on financial crime and corruption in 41 countries, conducted by the UK’s Foreign Policy Centre last year, three quarters of respondents reported receiving communications threatening legal action as a result of their work. Moreover, the UK was the leading international source of these threats, with almost as many originating from there as from EU countries and the US combined……

….More than 20 organisations, part of an informal UK anti-SLAPP coalition, have now launched a policy paper on countering legal intimidation and SLAPPs. The paper calls for a formal parliamentary inquiry to examine this issue in the UK, including the impact on those subjected to these tactics as well as the knock-on effect on public scrutiny, including investigations into corruption.

There is a need for legislative and regulatory reform, potentially in the shape of a UK Anti-SLAPP law. This would follow similar initiatives that have been advanced in the US and Canada, and in the European Union, which is examining proposals for an Anti-SLAPP Directive.

Stronger leadership is needed in the UK to tackle both the safety of journalists and the fight against corruption. A first step would be to recognise the symbiotic nature between the two. You cannot effectively protect and promote media freedom without first addressing the financial and legal systems that support attacks against it.’

For more blogs and articles related to Australian politics, EU European Union, Data Protection, Media, Political Strategy and Russia.

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Anglosphere – Radical Right Libertarian Socioeconomics and Authoritarianism

World Congress Of Families WCF, Russia, The Kremlin, Christian Conservative Nationalists, Dugin, Conservatives and US Evangelicals

An excellent article from Hélène Barthélemy for SPLC Southern Poverty Law Center titled ‘How the World Congress of Families serves Russian Orthodox political interests’ highlighting issues in Russia and links to others through World Congress of Families across Europe, the Anglosphere or US especially and elsewhere, influencing political influencers and impacting electoral politics.

Most would be familiar with the issues cited round the WCF World Congress of Families i.e. Orthodox anti-LGBT hate agitprop, family values, claiming persecution if western Christians, gay marriage, Alliance Defending Freedom ADF, nostalgia for the strong Russia of old, Anti EU and cosying up to befriend neo-Nazis and the far-right.

How the World Congress of Families serves Russian Orthodox political interests

May 16, 2018

Hélène Barthélemy

Hacked emails show how the American-run World Congress of Families advanced Russian political interests in Europe while offering Russian Orthodox oligarchs an entry point into U.S.-based Christian evangelical networks. 

In September 2014, the World Congress of Families representative in Russia, Alexey Komov, was contacted by a young woman who had spoken at a congress in Moscow on “Large Families: The Future of Humanity” a week earlier. Upon her return, she wrote, she had been harassed by American authorities. She was worried:

Since I returned to the USA, I have been living a nightmare in terms of finding myself—to my surprise—intimidated and harassed by the local authorities (first Homeland security in Houston, then Houston Police Department, EMS!) trailed by numerous cars when I leave my house and when I return, even at night, under surveillance elsewhere, and otherwise having my personal space bizarrely impinged upon, not only when I drive my car, but when I ride my bicycle. Absurd. I have reason to believe my Internet and cell phone use have also became the object of scrutiny. I realize the seriousness of what I am reporting and am scandalized and horrified to think what all this may imply.

The “Large Families” forum had already led to diplomatic conflict. The forum was initially organized by the influential World Congress of Families (WCF), an American-based Christian evangelical organization. An SPLC-designated anti-LGBT hate group, the WCF is dedicated to halting the spread of LGBT rights overseas in the name of the defense of the “natural family,” which they define as a husband and wife and their biological children. Since increasing its presence in Russia around 2011 after hiring Komov as a regional representative, in 2014 the WCF was planning its annual congress in Moscow. Like every year, the congress would unite anti-LGBT activists and politicians from all over the world.

But in February 2014, Russia’s invasion of Crimean territory in eastern Ukraine put a damper on those plans. The country was torn by protests in response to then-Ukrainian president Viktor Yakunovych’s decision to withdraw from an agreement with the European Union (E.U.) and move closer to Russia economically and politically. The situation eventually devolved into a full-blown civil war. The E.U. and the United States faced off against Russia’s desire to expand its influence and territory in Ukraine. As retaliation after the Crimean invasion, the U.S. and E.U. decided to sanction the high-level individuals who had been involved in the invasion, in which many WCF allies and backers soon found themselves embroiled.

For fear of American sanctions, the WCF’s American leadership publicly dropped its affiliation to the congress. Despite WCF officially pulling out, behind closed doors, a nearly identical conference was held the same day with a similar program, similar attendees, and — initially — the WCF listed as organizers. It was even attended by WCF communications director Don Feder and late managing director Larry Jacobs. Though Komov mentioned the WCF were organizers in the media, Jacobs maintained it was not.

As a new look at a trove of emails released in 2014 by the Russian hacker collective Shaltai Boltai (Humpty Dumpty) reveals, the 2014 Moscow Congress was just the tip of the iceberg. WCF’s involvement in Russian geopolitics runs deep and led to a collaboration that gave Russian Orthodox oligarchs apparent access to the powerful American Christian evangelical political machine. 

“Persecutions against Christians in the West will soon begin”

Komov has been the WCF’s representative in Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States (formed by 10 former Soviet Republics) for close to two decades. An influential man, he is deeply intertwined with various key figures within the Russian Orthodox Church. The young woman who wrote him was hoping he could help her with some advice, despite “the delicate situation in which our countries, quite unfortunately, find themselves.” 

After speaking to her, Komov emailed Konstantin Malofeev, one of the Russian Orthodox oligarch who bankrolled the “Large Families” forum in Moscow. As the founder of the investment company Marshall Capital, Malofeev heads the largest Orthodox charity in Russia, St. Basil the Great, which has a budget of over $40 million. Komov leads one of its charities. Both Komov and Malofeev are intimately tied to various facets of Russian politics, and Malofeev has a hand in everything from media to technology to security.

In his email to Malofeev, Komov suggested they bring the young woman’s case to trial in the U.S., fearing that her story revealed that “open persecutions against Christians in the West will soon begin.” To do so they could put the powerful American Christian evangelical apparatus in motion:

“Can discuss the plan of action with Brian [presumably, Brian Brown, who would become the president of the WCF but was then head of WCF ally National Organization for Marriage] to start? We can attract our best lawyers from the Alliance Defending Freedom or HLSDA, start collecting signatures under the appropriate petition all over the world through CitizenGO and launch a large-scale campaign in the press about this egregious case. It can turn out to be an excellent nationwide campaign, the guys from Personhood deal with such cases. If you do not answer with dignity, then they will break down and terrorize the entire American movement. What do you think?” 

The Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) is the most powerful Christian Right legal group in the U.S. and known for its recent case before the Supreme Court representing a baker who refused to provide service for a gay couple. The SPLC designates the ADF as a hate group. 

After Malofeev expressed skepticism at the authenticity of the young woman’s story, the men decided to run a background check on her. Based on the results, Komov abandoned the idea of a legal case, believing the young woman to be a plant. “Having carefully studied the profile of our martyr I am almost sure that she is sent to us,” he wrote Malofeev. 

Though the case itself never left the brainstorming stage, the email provides a rare look into how the U.S.-based WCF network operates and how its Russian representatives seek to impact American political and judicial discourse. It is only a small example of how the WCF network has been appropriated to serve as a soft power platform for the strategic interests of a small group of Russian Orthodox oligarchs.

A global alliance between Orthodox and Catholics

In 2013, Austin Ruse, who heads the U.S.-based Center for Family and Human Rights (C-Fam is also an SPLC-designated anti-LGBT hate group and part of the WCF network) recalledafter meeting Malofeev: “[Malofeev] wonders if some sort of grand global alliance between the Orthodox and Catholics can be achieved and what effect that might have on the global culture war advanced by the sexual left. I wonder, too.” 

An interfaith but overwhelmingly Christian network of global anti-LGBT “pro-family” allies, the WCF is an ideal platform to unify otherwise disparate groups. Anti-LGBT sentiment is the linchpin of opposition to the human-rights driven “liberalism” of the United Nations, the E.U. and, until recently, the U.S. While vehemently opposed to American cultural expansionism (equated to “the sexual left”), the WCF has become increasingly linked to some of the most prominent advocates for Russian expansionism.

Since the start of Putin’s third presidency in 2012, contemporary Russia has been defined by a “muscular, politically tinged Orthodox Christianity,” as Russian expert Charles Clover writes in Black Wind, White Snow. One feature of this Orthodoxy is “pro-family” values. Another is nostalgia for the strong Russia of old, united by Russian Orthodox values with its influence rippling across Europe, advanced by cultural, political or military means. Malofeev is a perfect embodiment of this duality, and one of Orthodox Russia’s most powerful figureheads. 

A longtime funder of anti-LGBT “pro-family values” in Russia through his foundation, Malofeev told The Financial Times, “I want the Russian Empire back. I don’t want to be head of it.” Malofeev is such a dedicated monarchist that he recently started a school to prepare the Russian elite’s youth for a future Russian monarchy. As he told the Guardian, he hopes Putin could be crowned tsar: “Everyone wants Putin to carry on forever.”

True to his expansionist ideals, Malofeev reportedly funded Russia’s 2014 Crimean invasion and is inextricably tied to it. Two of the leaders of the new pro-Russian Crimean Republic were his employees and also held short-lived minister positions in the rebel government of the self-declared Donetsk Republic, a Russian-backed separatist region in Ukraine. For his role in Crimea’s annexation and subsequent referendum, Malofeev was sanctioned by the U.S.and the E.U.

Using anti-LGBT sentiment as a wedge in Eastern Europe

Besides Malofeev’s role, the 2014 “Large Families” congress was inseparable from the invasion. A number of congress attendees or supporters were eventually sanctioned by the U.S. and/or E.U. for their support of it. 

One, for instance, was Russia’s hard-right parliamentarian Elena Mizulina, author of the infamous 2013 law banning “propaganda for non-traditional sexual relations” which led to a doubling of hate crimes against LGBT people in the five years since the law’s passage. At the “Large Families” congress, Mizulina led a legislative session in Russia’s lower chamber of parliament, the Duma, to teach attendees how to pass anti-LGBT legislation.

At the congress, Malofeev spoke on a topic dear to him during a panel on “Family Policy in Ukraine: Conclusions and Warnings for Russia.” He pointed out that the battle over LGBT issues was instrumental to the struggle over whether or not the country would join the E.U., which forbids discrimination against LGBT people for employment:

In Ukraine, which is our fraternal country, association with European Union was not signed last year because, in this case, the Ukrainians learned that they had to allow propagation of homosexuality and gay parades.

At this stage, the WCF had already placed pressure on some groups in Ukraine to move away from the E.U. by raising the specter of E.U.-imposed LGBT rights. Under Komov’s leadership, the WCF sent a delegation to Ukraine in October 2013 (only a few months before the Crimean annexation) and declared in its subsequent press release that:

The Ukrainian leaders expressed concern about the pressure brought to bear on their nation to accede to the homosexual agenda (including ‘gay marriage’) as a condition for membership in the European Union.

In fact, the E.U. does not require the legalization of same-sex marriage from its member states. One of the groups that the WCF met with in Ukraine, the All Ukrainians’ Parents Committee, declared: “We oppose the signing of the association agreement with the E.U., because it will lead to the inevitable homosexualizing of Ukraine.”  WCF leaders also met with some members of the Ukrainian parliament.

WCF’s involvement in the campaign to push Ukraine not to join the E.U. — and into the Russian fold — is not a coincidence. By all accounts, people shuttling through the WCF advocate for the same kind of agenda that Russian orthodox oligarchs have been pushing for. 

In April 2017, the former French WCF representative, Fabrice Sorlin, organized the first WCF regional conference in Paris. The list of events seemed oddly skewed towards the Balkans and Caucasus, featuring the following panels:

• Tactics and strategies of the gay lobby at the European Union
• Georgia’s Liberal Experience
• Russian Revival in the 21st century

• Europe or European Union – which way for Serbia?
• The aggressive anti-family policy of the European Union as a factor in destruction of Ukrainian statehood 

Sorlin is the former head of a brutal Catholic militia Dies Irae, whose mission was to prepare white French Catholic youth for a civil war against immigrants, black people and Muslims. He became the WCF French representative in 2013, during which time he traveled with the WCF leadership across Eastern Europe. Before his sudden death on April 30th, 2018, Larry Jacobs, the managing director of the International Organization for the Family, which oversees the WCF, denied that Sorlin was still employed when reached by Hatewatch. Sorlin, however, still lists his WCF position on his LinkedIn account.

The use of anti-LGBT politics by Russia to influence Eastern European countries to return to its fold and away from the E.U. has been well documented. This is a strategy that Putin has also used. For this, the WCF is a crucial platform.

In France, Sorlin was a non-negligible Russian ally: before his time at the WCF, Sorlin presided over the French group, Alliance France Europe Russia (AAFER). As historians Jean-Yves Camus and Nicolas Lebourg suggest, the AAFER was key in pushing the French far-right party, the National Front, toward Russia. 

In turn, Malofeev facilitated a loan of 2 million euros to the party from a Russian bank in 2014, when approached by National Front member Aymeric Chauprade, also a speaker at the “Large Families” congress. The WCF’s overseas allies, it turns out, are enmeshed in a network of extreme-right activists and politicians in Europe.

Eurasian networks: WCF members befriend neo-Nazis and the far-right 

In a piece written while serving as the WCF’s French representative, Sorlin supported the idea of an expanded Russia:

This Europe of the people and of nations would substitute technocratic Europe with a more traditional European civilization; it would promote Christianity within Europe, which has until now been dominated by the LGBT lobby. It must ally with Vladimir Putin’s Russia in order to create a version of Europe that stretches from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

This vision of a Europe led by Russia, also called Eurasianism, is one that is closely tied to the Russian Orthodox vision of the world. Its father, the influential ultra-nationalist philosopher Alexander Dugin, serves as the editorial director of Malofeev’s far-right Tsargrad TV channel. 

At its core, “Eurasia” is shorthand for Russian dominance of the Eurasian continent, though it is presented as a utopian vision for a unified but diverse civilizational bloc. For Dugin, who is fascinated with Nazi Germany, Eurasia would be a federation of countries led spiritually by Russia but Russia would be “the empire’s constitutive nation” and “the only national community within a supranational imperial complex.” 

Popular in white supremacist circles in Europe and the U.S., Dugin has identified white nationalists as potential allies for the Eurasian project insofar as they are traditionalists. Dugin was sanctioned by the U.S. for his role in the Crimean conflict. Since then, he and Malofeev have been involved in a plethora of influential foreign policy moves, seemingly not on behalf of the Russian state, though their reach leaves much to wonder. 

Dugin has been at the helm of a new strategic soft-power initiative, in which the WCF is also embroiled: a Eurasian conference, planned by Dugin alongside Emmanuel Leroy, the co-leader of the AAFER with Fabrice Sorlin. Leroy, who spoke at the same racist “White Forum” conference as white supremacist David Duke in 2007, has been involved with a shady pro-Russian “humanitarian” group in Ukraine.

A second installment of Dugin’s Eurasian conference was held in Chisinau, Moldova, in December 2017, and hosted by pro-Russian Moldovan president Igor Dodon. The WCF was present, with Alexey Komov attending. So did the Georgian WCF organizer and anti-LGBT activist, Levan Vasadze. Speakers and attendees included far-right figures, neo-Nazis and identitarians. 

The WCF ties to the Eurasian efforts seemed strengthened when it was announced that Moldova would also be the location of the next WCF congress, slated for September 2018. Moldova is currently in the midst of a tussle between pro-E.U. factions in the country, and pro-Russians, led by president Dodon. 

In August 2017, Dodon met with Malofeev to ask him to finance the upcoming congress according to Balkan Insight, which also alleges that Yakunin and Malofeev are the WCF’s main sponsors. Though WCF funding is hard to trace, as Christopher Stroop, a scholar focusing on Russia and the U.S. Christian Right, tells Hatewatch, “obviously [WCF] have a bigger budget than they let on.” 

Komov, though not directly involved in the Eurasian project despite being closely tied to its networks, might share its ideological vision. Emails released by the hacker collective Shaltai Boltai (Humpty Dumpty) show Komov emailing Dugin and Malofeev a picture of Serbia preparing for Putin’s visit with the caption “Our Serbs decorated the city for the arrival of Putin (the king of the Orthodox.)”

The emails also show Komov facilitating meetings between Malofeev and far-right and far-left European political figures. One email from November 2014 shows Komov emailing Roberto Fiore, the co-founder of the neo-fascist and violent Italian far-right party Forza Nuova. Fiore put Komov in touch with the far-right ELAM party in Cyprus, a Greek-only party that has ties to the neo-Nazi Greek party Golden Dawn.

In the email, Fiore, who seems to be planning on visiting Greece, also asks Komov to send a lawyer to a jail where leaders of the Greek Golden Dawn were being held: “can you send a lawyer for the 12 of December. We need name (sic) also to allow him, together with MEP and MP to enter the jail where the leaders of Golden Dawn are.”

Komov, referring to Fiore as “our pro-Russian Italian friend” then forwarded the email to the owner of the hacked account, Georgyi Gavrish. At the time, Gavrish was an employee at the Russian Embassy in Athens who, the emails show, is close to Dugin. He seems to have been running background checks on behalf of Komov and Malofeev. Komov wrote Gavrish:

“He [Fiore] asks if we can recommend lawyers and journalists in Athens – see below…”

What happened to the request is unclear. What is clearer is that the WCF’s Russian arm, through Komov, is intertwined with violent far-right political actors in Europe. More publicly, the WCF Russian representative is close to the Lega Nord (since renamed the Lega), the far-right anti-immigrant party that arrived at the top of the right-wing coalition in the recent Italian elections, which is a pro-Russian voice in Europe. Komov serves as the honorary president of the Associazione Culturale Lombardia Russia, ACLR, which orbits around Lega, and was essential to its formation.

As the cache of emails showed, Malofeev has also been a key agent in spreading Russian influence in various European countries. Malofeev sponsored a secret meeting for far-right parties in early March 2014 in Vienna through his Saint Basil the Great foundation, which he attended alongside Alexander Dugin. The meeting included Heinz-Christian Strache of the far-right Austrian party the FPÖ and presently Austria’s vice-chancellor; the National Front’s Aymeric Chauprade and Marion Maréchal-Le Pen; as well as far-right groups ranging from Bulgaria’s Ataka party to Spain’s monarchist and radical Catholic Carlist movement. It was meant to commemorate the alliance of Russia with Prussia and Austro-Hungary. At the meeting Dugin said: “We must conquer and join Europe. We are supported by a pro-Russian fifth column in Europe.” 

Malofeev, a WCF funder, Komov, the WCF’s Russian representative, and Sorlin, formerly the WCF’s French representative, seem to be working to advance a coherent geopolitical vision, which is not far from Dugin’s own Eurasian vision. 

It is unclear how enthusiastically the American leadership of the WCF is backing this civilizational project. The head of the International Organization for the Family and of WCF, Brian Brown, has been traveling to Moscow often, seemingly to promote his organization and to push for anti-LGBT legislation. The American leadership has made sympathetic statements about Russia and Hungary’s “illiberal” political regimes, with the late managing director of the WCF Larry Jacobs declaring that “the Russians might be the Christian saviors of the world.”

In choosing who to save, the alliance between WCF and Russian Orthodox oligarchs might be more selective than Noah putting together his ark, with its ferocious anti-LGBT sentiment and exclusive focus on heterosexual married unions. Nonetheless, Malofeev sees it as equally redemptive:

Civilization is on the verge of destruction, and only Russia can become a center of consolidation of all the healthy forces and resistance to the sodomization of the world, that is why the whole of Europe is looking at it with hope.’

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Putin’s Russia – Dugin – Alt Right – White Christian Nationalism – the Anglosphere and Europe

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Beyond the focus of Ukraine, Russia and influences in the former, Alexander Dugin has featured strongly.  

What does Russia’s Alexander Dugin represent? 

He represents conservative nationalist traditionalism described by some as fascist, new European right, deeply white nativist, promoting autocratic Christian nationalism and Eurasianism.

Furthermore, these sentiments are shared within the Anglosphere and Europe by many politicians, influencers and citizens, mostly of the alt or nationalist Christian right, and some of the left who believe in Kremlin agitprop e.g. ‘the great replacement’.

However, behind the noise including linking Xi-China to Putin-Russia and Ukraine, and desire for Belarus and Northern Kazakhstan to fortify Russia, it belies the dire demographics of Russia (Slavic decline & increasing numbers of Muslim citizens) with antipathy towards Asia and Chinese culture.

In fact for Putin, and his inner circle, citizens et al. have far more in common and shared interests with the NATO, US, EU, ‘west’ or Anglo Saxons which are dog whistled by Russian media and Putin supporters, including ageing left and alt right.  Many sympathisers can be linked to the network of deceased white nationalist John Tanton e.g. Steve Bannon and Dominic Cummings, also behind Brexit and leaving the EU to avoid constraints in business and e.g. green transitions away from fossil fuels. 

Following are two articles on Dugin, first from Miletic in Independent Australia, then followed by Liyanage from the CARR Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right:

‘Alexander Dugin: A Russian fascist who helped to convince Putin to invade

By Branko Miletic | 13 March 2022, 12:00pm 

The name Alexander Dugin is not known to most outside Russia, but millions are now openly dealing with the consequences of this man’s strange ideas.

According to his biography, Aleksandr Gelyevich Dugin was born in Moscow on 7 January 1962. Dugin is a Russian philosopher, professor, political analyst and strategist and the main organizer of the National Bolshevik Front and is a leading member of Vladimir Putin’s ruling United Russia party.

But Dugin is far more than just a political philosopher turned politician. Since 1999, he formally embraced the Old Believers, a Russian religious movement that rejected the reforms of the official Russian Orthodox Church.

In her book, Aleksandr Dugin: A Russian Version of the European Radical Right? , political scientist Marlene Laruelle writes Dugin is the inventor of a form of Russian fascism that harbours far-right ideologies underpinned by esoteric Nazism, Traditionalism, the German Conservative Revolution and the European New Right as its backbone.

And when not reinventing ‘fascism with a Russian soul’, he has also dabbled in Satanism, via the “Yuzhinsky group”, a dissident group that played with Satanism and the occult.

Dugin is the author of more than 30 books, among them Foundations of Geopolitics and The Fourth Political Theory.

But it’s Foundations of Geopolitics that is the cause of much of the world’s and now Ukraine’s angst.

It was Vladimir Putin who insisted this book become the official textbook for the Academy of the General Staff of the Russian military and in some ways, is the Russian version of Hitler’s Mein Kampf.

In 1997, in his article, ‘Fascism – Borderless and Red‘, Dugin described “national capitalism” as pre-empting the development of a ‘genuine, true, radically revolutionary and consistent, fascist fascism’ in Russia.

For Alexander Dugin, Ukraine is just the first step in reinventing humanity in some bizarre Neopagan, Slavic Nativist, Eastern Orthodox, anti-Capitalist “New World Order”, which ironically is an accusation both Dugin and his useful idiots in Anglo and European Far-Right movements accuse everyone else of trying to conceive.

How this will eventually play out no one knows, but one thing is for sure: millions of innocent Ukrainians have already paid dearly for Dugin’s “Slavo-Nazi” perversity with their homes, their livelihoods and even with their lives.’

Branko Miletic is a journalist, editor, historian and author who has written extensively on the wars in the Balkans and post-Yugoslavia politics for the past 20 years

From CARR Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right:

‘Aleksandr Dugin’s Ideology Echoes Through the Alt-Right

CHAMILA LIYANAGE    OCTOBER 29, 2019

Despite the challenges of occasional religious extremism, will liberal ideals continue to enjoy their indisputable status? Not anymore. Radical-right ideologues argue that traditional cultural identities can be used to develop an overarching thesis that can resonate with people across the globe in an attempt to defeat liberal values. By an accident of history, a relatively unknown man, a Russian named Aleksandr Dugin, has come to the fore as one of the key proponents of this ideology, with the intention of safeguarding cultural traditions, the Eurasian identity and the collective loyalties of homogenous communities.

The Eurasian Movement

Aleksandr Dugin is on a mission. He is a philosopher, credited with formulating Russian nationalism in the post-Soviet era that aimed to put Russia back “on the map.” Dugin is the leader of the Eurasian Movement, and his neo-Eurasianism ideology is often said to influence the Kremlin’s geopolitical outlook. At the movement’s launch in 2003, the then-Russian deputy foreign minister, Victor Kalyuzhny, and the deputy speaker of the Russian senate, Alexander Torshin, were listed as members of its higher council.

This is where neo-Eurasianism strikes, offering what Dugin sells as a complete package: a cause, an ideology and a strategy for a revolution to reclaim one’s identity and tradition. In essence, Dugin proposes “an alternative model of a conservative future.” Neo-Eurasianism includes such conflicting notions of “fundamental conservatism (traditionalism), social-conservatism and conservative revolution.” Such palingenesis in Dugin’s ideas intertwine with the ideas of Julius Evola, an Italian fascist traditionalist, who venerated traditional society and considered modernity as corruption.

A Guide to the Alt-Right

Dugin is on a crusade against liberal values to strengthen traditional collectives, such as racial and cultural identities. Can we see such ideas already at work within the wider radical right? Well, yes. Dugin envisages “an alternative model of conservatism,” which includes fundamental conservatism and a socially conservative revolution against current mainstream conservatism. There is a parallel here between Dugin’s idea and the alt-right movement that denounces conservatives of the establishment as “cuckservatives.” The alt-right embraces “natural conservatives” — people who are naturally self-conscious of their race, creed and color — an idea that is similar to Dugin’s fundamental conservatism.

In their article, Yiannopoulos and Bokhari highlight the alt-right assault on Western liberalism and democracy. In its place, the alt-right wants “natural instincts, tribal psychology, and identity politics: the preservation of tribe and its culture.” This overall idea can be found in Dugin’s work: “liberal individualism is destructive and criminal. It separates individuals from their collective identities.” According to Yiannopoulos and Bokhari, the alt-right aims to build “homogenous communities to preserve traditional identities: a separation from liberal cultures.” Dugin’s outrage over neoliberalism underlines all of these ideas.’

Dr Chamila Liyanage is a Policy and Practitioner Fellow at CARR and Researcher/Content Developer at Radical-R: Radicalisation Research. See her profile here.

For more articles and blogs on alt right, Brexit, dark money, fossil fuels, great replacement, Koch Network, Trump, white nationalism and populist politics click through:

Neo Conservative Rasputins? Putin and Dugin – Trump and Bannon – Johnson, Brexit and Cummings

Past Literature & Ideas on Roots of Radical Right, Nativism & the Great Replacement Today

Ecosystem of Libertarian Think Tanks and White Nativism in the Anglosphere

John Tanton – Australia – The Social Contract Press

Anglosphere Libertarianism in US, Australia and UK Tories with Dominic Cummings

55 Tufton Street London: US Koch & Tanton Networks’ Think Tanks – Radical Right Libertarians and Nativists

Neo Conservative Rasputins? Putin and Dugin – Trump and Bannon – Johnson, Brexit and Cummings

Recent events in Ukraine have increased scrutiny and highlighted influences upon President Putin in an autocratic regime, following on from the Czars with Orthodoxy, Nationalism and Rasputin, the Soviets could always claim Marx, Engels, Lenin, The Party et al., but for present day Russia, and Putin, Alexander Dugin is cited as a key influencer (who is manipulating whom?).

Further is there evidence of any relationship with the key influencers round Brexit UK or Trump’s America or Europe?

According to Dunlop (2004) via Stanford’s The Europe Center in ‘Aleksandr Dugin’s Foundations of Geopolitics’, claimed that Dugin, a ‘a neo-fascist ideologue’ with other intellectuals is ‘interested in mysticism, paganism, and fascism’, ‘conservative revolution’, National Bolshevik Party, his theories partly adopted by the military, Russia as Eurasian, and backed up with some hierarchical views: ‘“Russians should realize that they are Orthodox in the first place; [ethnic] Russians in the second place; and only in the third place, people”. 

Further Dugin on America, echoes of Capitol Hill: ‘”It is especially important,” Dugin adds, “to introduce geopolitical disorder into internal American activity, encouraging all kinds of separatism and ethnic, social and racial conflicts, actively supporting all dissident movements– extremist, racist, and sectarian groups, thus destabilizing internal political processes in the U.S. It would also make sense simultaneously to support isolationist tendencies in American politics“.

Martin Lee’s excellent (1997) ‘The Beast Reawakens: Fascism’s Resurgence from Hitler’s Spymasters to Today’s Neo-Nazi Groups & Right-wing Extremists‘ was prescient in highlighting movement of far right ideology post WWII including former Soviet Union, cited Dugin and also that a Putin like figure would emerge to take advantage of new expanded Presidential powers (plus e.g. funding far right in both Europe and US).

The Russian ideologue Alexander Dugin highlighted by Teitelbaum in New Statesman (8 Oct ’20) ‘The rise of the traditionalists: how a mystical doctrine is reshaping the right Steve Bannon, Russia’s Alexander Dugin and Brazil’s Olavo de Carvalho are united by their affinity with a spiritual movement that fundamentally rejects modernity…

…Repudiating the Enlightenment, traditionalists instead celebrate what they regard as timeless values. They honour precedence rather than progress, emphasise the spiritual over the material, and advocate surrender to the fundamental disparities – as opposed to equality – between humans and human destinies‘

In addition to Putin’s ‘project’, related is the UK oligarchs and (not limited to) Tory scandals, the US fossil fueled nativist libertarian ‘project’ which is being challenged; especially with the benefit of hindsight and scrutiny of Brexit and Trump.

Central in these nativist and/or conservative libertarian ‘projects’ were European and Anglo seers, with the former including far right politicians in Europe, funded by Putin including Le Pen or strongly influenced e.g. Hungary’s PM Orban.

However, in the Anglosphere of UK, US and Australia, eccentric figures have been promoted by the right also, often in the late John Tanton’s nativist Tanton Network, who had been an ideological muse of Steve Bannon, while in the UK central round Brexit and subsequent PM Johnson, was Dominic Cummings. 

While Bannon can be easily linked to the influence of Dugin in his ramblings masquerading as analysis and philosophy as New Statesman has done, Cummings can too,  This is reflected in his Russian connections, his writings and Brexit campaign; Gordon of the North East Bylines UK has stated as much in (3 August 2020)  ‘Cummings, Brexit and Russia: Part 1‘ highlighting Cumming’s attitude towards immigration and the EU, in attempts by Cummings to justify his antipathy.

Finally China and Russia, and although there is an agreement for cooperation on the old ‘Silk Road’ or the Belt & Road Initiative with China, one assumes the Chinese security services and academia have studied Dugun closely; if not they should, why?

Not only did he state that Ukraine needed to be part of Russia, and assumed unity in the Orthdox Church in regional states (absolutely untrue as ‘2021 schism between Greek and Russian Churches showed) he stated:

‘China, which represents a danger to Russia, “must, to the maximum degree possible, be dismantled”. Dugin suggests that Russia start by taking Tibet–Xinjiang–Inner Mongolia–Manchuria as a security belt.  Russia should offer China help “in a southern direction – Indochina (except Vietnam), the Philippines, Indonesia, Australia” as geopolitical compensation.’ (Johnson, 2004).

What do President Xi and The Party think of that?

For more related blogs and articles click through below: 

Russian Dark Money – Influencing British Politics, the Conservative Party, the GOP and European Right

The Beast Reawakens 1997 – Review – Radical Right Populism in Europe and the Anglosphere

Anglosphere Libertarianism in US, Australia and UK Tories with Dominic Cummings

Anglosphere Legacy Media: White Nativist and Libertarian Propaganda for Ageing Conservative Voters – Australia, Brexit & Trump

Ecosystem of Libertarian Think Tanks and White Nativism in the Anglosphere