(CN) — Ahead of European Parliament elections in June, European politics were rocked on Tuesday after Germany's popular far-right party, the Alternative for Germany, was accused of harboring a Chinese spy on its Brussels staff.
The arrest of Jian Guo, an aide to Maximilian Krah, the AfD's lead candidate in the European elections, came less than a month after several European lawmakers, including Krah and another top AfD candidate, were accused by Czech and Belgian prosecutors of taking Russian money to spread Kremlin propaganda.
Krah won a seat in the European Parliament in 2019 representing Dresden in Eastern Germany. Since then, Guo, a 43-year-old German national, has worked in Brussels and Dresden as Krah's close aide. He was arrested late Monday in Dresden.
These scandals are adding to an atmosphere of heightened political tension in Europe with far-right nationalist parties expected to make significant gains in the June 6-9 European elections. The vote will determine the makeup of the next European Parliament and shape the direction of EU policies for the next five years. The parliament is expected to turn to the right.
Warnings about “foreign disinformation” and “foreign interference,” especially Russian, in the elections — and accusations of the far right's complicity in such messaging — are growing louder as the election draws nearer.
For weeks, Věra Jourová, a top EU commissioner, has been on a “Democracy Tour” around Europe to warn about the dangers of Russia seeking to influence the elections and backing political parties opposed to the West's support for Ukraine. Far-right and far-left parties often take views seen as pro-Russian and pro-Chinese.
Then at the end of March, Czech media reported that prosecutors in that country were investigating links between several far-right European Parliament members and an obscure Russia-backed online news outlet based in Prague called Voice of Europe. Ukrainian oligarch and politician Viktor Medvedchuk, an ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, reportedly backed the outlet.
Prosecutors said they had evidence parliamentarians had taken payments from Voice of Europe for spreading Russian propaganda. On its website, Voice of Europe features interviews with far-right European Parliament members, activists and politicians.
AfD politicians Krah and Petr Bystron were among those accused of taking bribes. Both politicians denied the accusations, calling them a “defamation campaign.”
“This is just an attempt to keep the campaign against the AfD in the media until the EU elections,” Bystron told Germany’s DPA news agency.
Czechia's domestic intelligence service, the BIS, says it has video showing Bystron taking 20,000 euros ($21,300) in cash from the manager of Voice of Europe while sitting in a parked car, according to media reports. Bystron has demanded the evidence be made public.
The scandal was quickly dubbed “Russiagate” and sparked a flurry of accusations against far-right parties, including from the leaders of EU institutions.
“They have never made a secret of their admiration for the democracy despiser in the Kremlin,” said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, at a political gathering where she castigated the AfD politicians. “They have carried his propaganda into our societies. Whether they have taken bribes for it or not.”
Jourová accused Russia of conducting a widespread campaign to steer the elections in a direction it favors.
“It shows that Russia is using every possible channel to influence public opinion in the European Union,” she said on CNN after the Voice of Europe accusations were revealed. “They are using disinformation as part of their military doctrine.”
She said Russia was “using hidden ways to influence EU politicians, which is corruption and this has to be investigated.”
Then came the arrest of Guo.
Germany's Federal Prosecutor's Office accused him of working for China's secret service and repeatedly passing on information about negotiations and decisions in the European Parliament to China in January. Prosecutors also accused him of spying on Chinese dissidents in Germany. Die Zeit, a German newspaper, reported that Krah previously had acted as a lawyer for Guo, a trade expert, and that they had traveled together to China.
Ahead of national elections in 2021, Germany's country's domestic intelligence service put the party under surveillance after it designated the AfD a suspected extremist group. The AfD partially overturned the surveillance order in court challenges, though at least three regional AfD branches remain under surveillance, according to news reports. AfD stands for Alternative für Deutschland, the party's German name.
In a statement, Krah said he learned of Guo's arrest through media reports.
“Spying for a foreign state is a serious accusation,” Krah said. He added that he would fire Guo immediately “if the allegations prove true.”
Tuesday's charges put more pressure on the AfD and had the potential to undermine its support further. Polls show the party's popularity has dropped from 22% to about 18% since large-scale protests broke out in January following revelations that top-ranking party members attended an event where plans to deport masses of “foreigners” were discussed.
Some German politicians have pushed banning the party on the grounds that it is an undemocratic force seeking to undermine the German constitution.
In Brussels, European lawmakers demanded swift investigations into accusations of election inference.
Manfred Weber, the leader of conservative European People's Party, the largest group in the European Parliament, called the AfD “unpatriotic.”
“Whoever votes for the AfD gets Putin and China,” Weber said.
“The European far right drapes itself in the supposed defense of our nations and our fellow citizens,” said Valérie Hayer, the leader of Renew Europe, a group representing liberal parties. “In reality, the interests they are defending are those of Moscow and Beijing.”
The Chinese government dismissed the accusations, calling the arrests of Guo and of three German nationals on Monday accused of spying for China as “disinformation” and a “malicious smear” to damage the relationship between Beijing and Brussels.
“We hope the relevant people in Germany can abandon their Cold War mentality and stop using the so-called spy threat to engage in anti-China political manipulation,” a spokesperson for China's foreign ministry said, as quoted by the Associated Press.
Courthouse News reporter Cain Burdeau is based in the European Union.
Follow @cainburdeau
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