Kremlin critic Navalny with a clear opinion on the French election - "shocked" by Le Pen's Putin connection

Created: 04/24/2022, 06:04

By: Christoph Gschossmann

Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny hopes Emmanuel Macron will win the French election.

© Uncredited/Moscow City Court/dpa

In the elections in France, Kremlin critic Alexej Navalnjy has a clear election proposal: he calls for the election of Emmanuel Macron.

Munich - France election and Ukraine war: two drastic events that shape the future of Europe.

Russia has been heavily criticized in the international community for its invasion of Ukraine.

But Putin's influence also plays a role in France.

Shortly before the decisive round of the French presidential election, Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny expressed a clear opinion on the election: he called for incumbent Emmanuel Macron to vote.

His opponent, the right-wing populist Marine Le Pen, has ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, the Russian opposition activist said on Twitter on Wednesday.

The Russia critic was "shocked" that Le Pen's party, then called Front National, received a €9 million loan in 2014 from "Putin's notorious money-laundering facility," the First Czech-Russian Bank Navalny.

He does not doubt that this deal "also had an opaque political component".

"It's corruption.

And it's a sale of political influence to Putin," added the 45-year-old.

French election: Marine Le Pen criticized for being close to Putin

The right-wing populist's proximity to Russian President Putin and the fact that her party is financed by Russian donors are the main points of attack for her critics.

Her party justified the loans from Russian-Czech lenders by saying that they had not found any other bank in Europe.

In the first round of the presidential election, Le Pen came second to incumbent Macron in the runoff for the presidency.

The decisive round will take place next Sunday.

Navalny has been in prison since the beginning of last year.

He is considered the most prominent critic of the Kremlin in Russia.

A poison attack was carried out on him in Russia in 2020, for which he blames the Kremlin.

He denies the accusation.