On July 8th, Russian missiles struck the Okhmatdyt Children’s Hospital in Kyiv. European nations quickly rallied around Ukraine, with Lithuania promising one million euros to reconstruction efforts and Germany expressing a desire to admit displaced patients. However, one NATO member, Slovakia, responded contrarily. Days after the strike, the Slovak parliament failed to pass a bill condemning the attack. Slovakia’s official reticence is remarkable relative to other NATO members, especially following the alliance’s 75th Anniversary Summit and the frequent iterations of support for Ukraine made during the event. More worrisome still to NATO stalwarts, Bratislava’s silence may have been partly orchestrated by Moscow itself.
Russia went to great lengths to interfere in Slovakia’s pivotal 2023 parliamentary and 2024 presidential elections that installed Fico and those loyal to him in public office. Targeting the pro-Russian sympathies and anti-Western nationalist sentiments among the Slovak populace, Russia-linked propogandists worked to enflame domestic tensions and fragment public support for a united Western policy towards Ukraine. In tandem with these efforts, Fico and his Smer-SD party rode a wave of antiestablishment sentiment and Ukraine-skeptic rhetoric to victory. Russian electoral interference helped smooth Fico’s path to victory, and while perhaps not decisive, it empowered a government which is now vigorously hacking at Slovakia’s civil society and democratic institutions.
Certain conditions within Slovakia made the country uniquely susceptible to Russian electoral interference. Slovakia possesses historical and cultural linkage to Russia by means of pan-Slavic sentiments, with 78% of Slovaks considering Russia their traditional Slavic brother nation. Slovakia also has high levels of political polarization, which acts as a breeding ground for conspiracy theories that Russia’s Internet Research Agency seeks to propagate. Finally, Slovakia is a member of both the EU and NATO, organizations in which Russia is eager to sow discord. As for the democratic backsliding resulting from these pivotal elections, that was also not a phenomenon completely manufactured by Russia. Corruption has marred Slovak national politics for years, so Fico and his allies did not have to create entirely new inroads to reinstate autocratic practices.
Yet while accounting for these nuances, there is much to be learned from Russia’s attempted undermining of Slovak elections. As observers continue monitoring this “year of elections,” they should consider Slovakia a sterling example of the interplay between Russian electoral interference and democratic backsliding: the unholy duo that academics call “autocracy promotion”.
Russia and Slovakia
In the parliamentary elections, Fico represented Slovak skepticism about supporting Ukraine. Fico had expressed sentiments relatively favorable to the Kremlin since 2014, resisting NATO expansion and criticizing EU sanctions of Russia as “meaningless”. While the pragmatic goal of wanting to maintain semi-positive relations with Russia undergirded some of this rhetoric, nationalism also constituted a driving force. Fico portrayed a pro-Western foreign policy as the thoughtless regurgitation of American interests; as an alternative, he vowed to lead Slovakia as an independent thinker. Opportunism also drove Fico’s policy stances, as he is known to capitalize on Slovaks voters’ frustrations by railing against the status quo. For example, in response to the Slovak government’s strict COVID restrictions, Fico led protests against lockdowns. In addition to being an opportunistic nationalist, Fico along with his Smer-SD allies is deeply corrupt. His corruption helped fuel anti-government protests in 2018, which prompted Fico’s departure from the premiership.
Despite his ignominious resignation in 2018, Fico resurrected his political career leading up to the 2023 parliamentary elections. He drew on a disestablishment feeling which had persisted under chaotic coalition governments that led Slovakia since his departure. Fico reengaged his original base of rural voters, disillusioned by government promises. Moving beyond domestic policies, Fico attracted those already harboring pro-Russian sympathies, including far-right and leftist voters. With this variety of grievances and interests noted, it is difficult to disregard Fico’s election as purely a product of Russian disinformation. That said, Russia certainly aimed to bolster Fico during the campaigning and voting periods of the 2023 parliamentary elections through disinformation designed to undermine trust in democratic institutions and slander Fico’s political opponents.
Moscow’s goals in Slovakia were twofold: tilt public opinion towards Russia and institutionalize this support through the election of pro-Moscow officials. The Russian disinformation leviathan hoped to serve Fico by providing fodder for his arguments, cultivating pro-Russian sympathies, and enflaming antiestablishment sentiments. 253 disinformation-peddling outlets, 1,800 Facebook pages, embassies, spies, and troll farms all helped cast NATO and the US as the true provocateurs of the Ukraine-Russia conflict. These efforts coincided with a noteworthy public opinion shift. GLOBEC, a Slovakia-based think tank, found that in 2023, only 40% of Slovaks believed Russia was responsible for invading Ukraine, compared to 51% in 2022. The Kremlin frames this shift in perception as an informed retake on the Western narrative, as Slovaks “having [their] own opinion about the situation in the world.” In reality, this public opinion shift publicly legitimized a violation of international law. Additionally, this change in attitude threatened to weaken solidarity within NATO’s borders, worrying EU lawmakers concerned with maintaining a united policy towards Ukraine. As Slovakia prepared its polling stations last October, Russia doubled down on its interference efforts.
The weeks leading up to Slovakia’s parliamentary election witnessed a deluge of Russia-linked interference efforts. In the first half of September, more than 365,000 election-related disinformation posts featured on Slovak social media, with these posts generating an average of five times a post’s average reach. And just two days before the October election, a deepfake audio recording emerged of Michal Šimečka, Fico’s primary challenger, discussing rigging the election and buying off votes from Slovakia’s marginalized Roma minority. The recording was eventually discredited, but only after its wide dissemination – and Šimečka’s loss to Fico.
Russia’s anti-democratic electoral interference, or autocracy promotion, was followed by democratic backsliding led by the new Prime Minister. After his election, Fico embarked upon a series of Russia-favorable and autocratic initiatives. The two types of policies sometimes overlapped, such as when Fico secured the removal of Jozef Hambálek, a Slovak biker gang leader who would train individuals to fight against Kyiv, off the EU’s list of sanctioned individuals. On the other hand, some pro-Russian bills did not directly impact Slovakia’s democratic institutions, such as Slovakia’s decision to cease directly sending weapons to Ukraine on a state-level. Other policies had nothing to do with Russia but dismantled Slovakia’s democracy and hamstringed its protectors, such as the abolishment of the Special Prosecutor’s Office, the passage of a law that deemed many NGOs critical of Smer-SD as “foreign agents,” the promulgation of limits on whistleblower protection, and the proposal of changes to the tax code which would drastically curtail civil society organizations’ fundraising options. Thus, following Russia’s autocracy promotion efforts, Fico has successfully and intentionally eroded Slovakia’s democratic status while also, but not always simultaneously, orienting Slovakia’s foreign policy towards Russia.
Slovakia’s March 2024 presidential election attested to the continuation of Russian interference efforts in Slovak politics. Peter Pellegrini, a longtime ally of Fico and leader of a Smer-SD breakoff, ran against Ivan Korčok, a career diplomat embodying pro-Western Slovak foreign policy stances. As he did in the parliamentary election, Fico, eager to cement his control and instate an ally as president, played off pro-Russian sympathies by labeling Korčok as “warmonger who unhesitatingly supports everything the West tells him”. After the inconclusive first-round vote, Russian disinformation claiming that Pellegrini’s opponent would reinstate military conscription and send Slovak soldiers to Ukraine supported this slander. Moscow’s desires were fulfilled: Pellegrini won the presidential office in a run-off.
Despite the overtness of Russian interference, the Slovak government did not reprimand Moscow’s diplomats as it had after the parliamentary election. Instead, Fico’s emboldened government continued silencing dissenters, most recently with an overhaul of Slovakia’s public broadcasting system to with the understood aim of turning it into a mouthpiece for Smer-SD. Slovakia’s departure from the NATO line has provoked tensions with its neighbors, even prompting the Czech Republic to suspend intergovernmental cooperation with Bratislava. Almost certainly, Russia is pleased with the 2023 and 2024 electoral outcomes and the policies that followed.
The story of autocracy promotion in Slovakia has many nuances, and Russia’s sway over Slovakia should not be overstated. For reasons apart from Russian interference, Slovaks have resisted NATO expansion for years, and public support for the initial shipments of weapons to Kyiv was far from ironclad. Also, while Slovak Foreign Minister Juraj Blanár met with Sergei Lavrov in March, two months earlier, the Slovak parliament empowered the defense ministry to allow the shipment weapons to Ukraine through public and private companies. More recently, Fico contradicted his pro-Russian statements by declaring that Bratislava stood by Kyiv. Generally speaking, Fico’s brazen rhetoric concerning Russia and Ukraine has not been followed by monumental shifts in Slovakia’s actual foreign policy. On the democratic front, Bratislava still reaps major financial benefits from the EU, and reductions in funds due to rule-of-law violations will likely frustrate Slovak voters. That said, Fico and his allies have undoubtedly eroded the robustness of Slovakia’s democracy and civil society, and Russia was eager to empower them in doing so.
Conclusion
Moscow will target elections again and again this year. The methods of interference in this regard are quite consistent. As in Slovakia’s case, prior to the election, Russia may embark upon a vigorous disinformation campaign facilitated by its infamous Internet Research Agency and designed to support pro-Russian and, more often than not, simultaneously autocratic-leaning actors by diminishing trust in traditional politicians and democratic institutions. On election day itself, Moscow may provide alternative election monitors that will declare legitimate a fraudulent election, thereby diluting a democratic norm into a rubber stamp. If Putin’s favored autocrat gains power, he can publicly recognize him as the elected official, providing rhetorical support. If the public protests the election outcome, Moscow may offer military support to quell the protests, as it did after Belarus’s 2020 elections. If instead democratic actors gain power, Russia could support efforts to launch a coup against them, often undertaking more disinformation campaigns to pit public opinion against the democratic leader before his or her ouster. Such was the case in Burkina Faso after Russian disinformation portrayed the incumbent, President Roch Kabore, as unable to deal with Islamists, smoothing the way for the January 2022 coup d’etat that installed a Russia-favorable autocrat in Ouagadougou.
Russia’s autocracy promotion is not confined to electoral interference. Russia can work to crush nascent democratic movements through military intervention, such as when it intervened in Syria on behalf of President Bashar al-Assad. Economic coercion constitutes another means of autocracy promotion, having taken the form of Russia’s “negative sanctions” (i.e., blackmailing) against unfavorable Armenian politicians. And Russia also willingly provides diplomatic shielding for human rights abusers, as shown when Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov visited Eswatini’s King Mswati III shortly after the African dictator ordered the brutal murder of human rights lawyer and opposition activist Thulani Maseko.
When trying to ascertain the true impact of Russian interference in shaping outcomes, observers should be cautious to claim causality. In Slovakia, the interplay of Russian disinformation and Smer-SD’s populist rhetoric is so entangled, teasing the two apart is extraordinarily difficult. Additionally, not all of Russia’s autocracy promotion efforts actually work. Consider how Russia’s past autocracy promotion efforts in Ukraine and Georgia actually accelerated democratization in these post-Soviet states by stoking fears of Russian encroachment on domestic politics. The presence of Russian interference and its actual impact are two separate concepts deserving individual study. That said, when it comes to Slovakia’s 2023 and 2024 elections, Russian interference very much seemed to play to Fico’s favor, thereby helping enable the Smer-SD-led democratic backsliding.
As Russia seeks to sow discord among Western countries and their allies, it will continue to concentrate on elections. Yes, 2024 is the “year of elections,” but this optimistic-sounding era attracts an ugly counterpart: the year of autocracy promotion.
