Vladimir Putin who considers the European Union as a strategic rival, seeks partners who could weaken the common policies of the EU.
ADVERTISEMENTOn Tuesday Russia's president Vladimir Putin will host perhaps his closest ally in the European Union, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.
Both leaders are fiercely nationalistic and, since Hungary was once part of the Soviet bloc, they have, at least partly, a shared history.
The nationalist mood is also being felt in other EU states and that, one Russian academic claims, is welcomed by Russia.
"Now very many political forces in Europe are turning towards Russia, seeking in it some kind of alternative to this globalist ideology, of a globalist cultural type, not only Hungary, the same goes for part of French society, in Germany, in Italy it's happening," said Andrey Sidorov, the head of international relations at Moscow State University.
But the director of the Hungarian Political Capital Institute highlights how out of balance Putin' s relationship with Orban really is.
"As Sputnik Russian news agency once remarked, Hungary and Viktor Orbán serve as a battering ram in the hands of Moscow and Putin against EU sanctions and the European Union. A battering ram is rarely equal partner at the negotiations," Peter Krekó,said.
Putin can also count on friendly relations with politicians within Italy's and Austrias far-right governments, as well as within Poland's political elite.