Flowers for the aggressor, or why Slovakia’s PM is flying to Moscow and why this is once again dividing the EU

Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico is once again making European partners nervous. On May 9, he plans to visit Moscow.
And although the Slovak leader is unlikely to be among the spectators of the military parade on Red Square, his program, laying flowers at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and holding a short meeting with Vladimir Putin, has already become a serious political gesture.

This visit does not merely irritate Brussels. It clearly highlights the line of division within the European community itself. One only has to look at the reaction of Slovakia’s neighbors. The Baltic states acted as a united front, without any compromises, and closed their airspace to Fico’s aircraft on its way to Russia. In the Czech Republic, the situation turned out differently. Political forces from the orbit of Andrej Babiš demonstrated a telling loyalty, making it clear that they had no objection to the Slovak government plane transiting through Czech airspace. This contrast only confirms that a unified approach to isolating the aggressor in the region still, or once again, does not exist.

Fico himself brushes off the criticism. He openly ignores the warnings of Europe’s top diplomats, including High Representative Kaja Kallas, speaks of his right to pursue a “sovereign policy,” and adds that he feels no remorse whatsoever about the trip.

The problem lies not only in the trip itself, but also in the date. In today’s Russia, May 9 has long ceased to be simply a day of remembrance for the Second World War. For the Kremlin, it has become the central ritual of a militarized state identity through which Moscow seeks to justify its current aggression against Ukraine as well. That is why the presence of a European prime minister in Moscow on that day will inevitably be read as a political gesture of legitimization, regardless of whether he stands on the parade platform or merely lays flowers.

The “Kremlin needle” as a political instrument

The official reason for the visit sounds noble enough: “gratitude for the liberation of Europe in 1945.” But historical memory in this game is merely a convenient screen.

Behind the rhetoric of “historical memory” and “sovereign policy” lies a very concrete interest: energy. Fico is consistently trying to preserve room for cooperation with Russia where gas, oil, and the entire political economy of dependency are concerned, the very system on which the loyalty of certain Central European elites to Moscow has been built for decades. That is why this visit should not be read as a sentimental gesture, but as an attempt to preserve a channel of communication with the Kremlin at a moment when the EU is moving in the opposite direction, toward the gradual dismantling of Russian energy influence.

In reality, the meeting with Putin is a signal to Fico’s own Eurosceptic and pro-Russian electorate. Fico presents himself as an independent player who is “ready for dialogue,” while Moscow, in return, receives the television image it so badly needs of a breach in its diplomatic isolation. It is a mutually beneficial exchange at the expense of European unity.

It is also important that the trip to Moscow is addressed not only to an external audience. For Fico, it is also a signal to his own voters. He continues to sell himself as a politician who supposedly does not submit to the “dictate of Brussels” and is capable of pursuing an “independent” course. In this sense, Moscow is for him not only a foreign policy direction, but also an instrument of domestic political mobilization. The more Fico clashes with the European consensus, the easier it becomes for him to consolidate that segment of the electorate that sees an anti-European posture as proof of “strength” and “sovereignty.”

One may approach the situation in a purely pragmatic way and say: fine, let us see what comes of it. Will this meeting bring Bratislava any real economic dividends, or will it remain merely a symbolic gesture? But the main question remains open, and it is far deeper than economics.

This is the fifth year of Russia’s full-scale aggression, which is not merely a war against Ukraine, but an open confrontation of worldviews, a direct threat to the values and ideas on which modern Europe was built. And logic fails here: why would the leader of a country that benefits from all the economic and security umbrellas of the EU and NATO fly to a personal meeting with the very man who is dismantling that security?

Robert Fico’s trip is yet another disturbing symptom of the pro-Russian disease affecting certain Western leaders, a disease that impacts the entire region. The Slovak prime minister’s visit once again proves that even after the horrific destruction on the continent, there are still politicians willing to shake hands with the initiator of this war.

That is precisely why the story of Fico’s visit goes far beyond the Slovak-Russian relationship. It is a test for the European Union itself. Is it capable not only of declaring unity on security issues, but also of drawing a political line where individual leaders begin openly blurring the regime of isolation imposed on the aggressor? If Brussels’ response is once again limited to rhetorical condemnation, it will only reinforce the sense that, inside the EU, it is still possible to trade common principles with impunity for the sake of short-term domestic political dividends.

And it is precisely the way in which the European Union responds in a consolidated manner to this precedent that will show whether Europe is truly capable of faithfully defending its principles when those principles are quite literally being spat upon from the window of a flight to Moscow.