Kremlin Interference Campaign Targets Eastern European Elections

On 10 March 2025, The Moscow Times report­ed that experts are iden­ti­fy­ing pat­terns of Russ­ian inter­fer­ence in recent elec­tions through­out East­ern Europe as part of the Krem­lin’s broad­er strat­e­gy to under­mine democ­ra­cies. The arti­cle begins:

From 100 days of con­tin­u­ous protests in Geor­gia over con­test­ed elec­tion results to Roma­nia bar­ring fron­trun­ner Calin Georges­cu from May’s re-run pres­i­den­tial elec­tion: the shad­ow of Russ­ian influ­ence looms large over East­ern Europe. Experts say these inci­dents are part of the Krem­lin’s broad­er strat­e­gy to sow dis­trust and sway elec­tions in what it con­sid­ers to be its sphere of influ­ence as these coun­tries seek to deep­en coop­er­a­tion with the West. The elec­tion inter­fer­ence pat­terns seen in Geor­gia, Roma­nia and Moldo­va high­light a trou­bling real­i­ty for Europe: Moscow’s hybrid war­fare strate­gies are becom­ing increas­ing­ly sophis­ti­cat­ed and per­va­sive. Over three years of war in Ukraine and the fail­ure to pre­vent the oust­ing of ally Bashar al-Assad in Syr­ia have exposed the weak­ness­es of Rus­si­a’s mil­i­tary, once thought to be one of the strongest in the world. In a joint arti­cle for the Finan­cial Times, the heads of MI6 and the CIA warned Rus­sia is inten­si­fy­ing its hybrid war­fare approach, shift­ing focus from con­ven­tion­al mil­i­tary dom­i­nance to desta­bi­liz­ing democ­ra­cies from with­in — “spread­ing lies and dis­in­for­ma­tion designed to dri­ve wedges between us.”…

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Key Points:
• Russ­ian inter­fer­ence has trig­gered protests in Geor­gia while Roman­ian author­i­ties barred a sus­pect­ed Krem­lin-backed can­di­date from upcom­ing elections.
• Moscow has report­ed­ly spent $100 mil­lion influ­enc­ing Moldova’s EU ref­er­en­dum, which passed by only 1% despite wide­spread dis­in­for­ma­tion campaigns.
• Intel­li­gence agen­cies warn Rus­sia has shift­ed from con­ven­tion­al mil­i­tary tac­tics to hybrid war­fare that exploits exist­ing social divisions.
• The rise of right-wing pop­ulism and reduced West­ern uni­ty have cre­at­ed favor­able con­di­tions for Russ­ian inter­fer­ence oper­a­tions across East­ern Europe.