Slovak PM Drops Patriots of Europe, Plans New Friends of Peace Group

Slo­vak Prime Min­is­ter Robert Fico has dropped plans to join Patri­ots for Europe and is con­sid­er­ing cre­at­ing a new par­lia­men­tary group. On 17 Novem­ber 2025, Euronews report­ed that Fico aide and MEP Moni­ka Ben­o­va said he no longer plans to join a dif­fer­ent for­ma­tion after Smer’s expul­sion from the Par­ty of Social­ists and Democ­rats. The arti­cle begins:

Slo­vak Prime Min­is­ter Robert Fico has dropped plans to join the hard-right Patri­ots for Europe in the Euro­pean Par­lia­ment, a close aide and MEP Moni­ka Ben­o­va told Euronews. Fico’s Smer par­ty was expelled from the Par­ty of Social­ists and Democ­rats in Octo­ber for “breach­ing the val­ues” of the cen­tre-left par­ty fam­i­ly, a move which trig­gered spec­u­la­tion about a pos­si­ble trans­fer to Patri­ots of Europe. Despite hold­ing meet­ings with Hun­gar­i­an Prime Min­is­ter Vik­tor Orbán, Fico no longer plans to join a dif­fer­ent for­ma­tion and is look­ing at cre­at­ing his own.

Read more: https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2025/11/17/fico-drops-joining-patriots-could-create-new-parliament-group-with-friends-of-peace

Key Points

• Ben­o­va told Euronews that, fol­low­ing dis­cus­sions with Fico, he does not want to join anoth­er group and is wait­ing until next year, with one option being to set up a new par­lia­men­tary group artic­u­lat­ed around a coali­tion of friends of peace with like-mind­ed left-ori­ent­ed parties.
• Fico stat­ed in the Octo­ber tele­vised debate in Bratisla­va that the goal of Slo­vak for­eign pol­i­cy is not the defeat of the Russ­ian Fed­er­a­tion but to end the war in Ukraine as soon as pos­si­ble, argu­ing that these are Slavs killing each oth­er and war is not a solution.
• Slo­vak press reports that a pos­si­ble can­di­date for future coop­er­a­tion could be Ger­many’s Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance, which split from Die Linke par­ty and is crit­i­cal of migra­tion while blam­ing the West for the war in Ukraine.
• Set­ting up new polit­i­cal group would require Fico to secure at least 23 MEPs from sev­en dif­fer­ent EU mem­ber states, pre­sent­ing chal­leng­ing task after Smer’s Octo­ber expul­sion from Par­ty of Social­ists and Democ­rats for breach­ing cen­tre-left values.

Slovakia’s Role in the Global National Conservative Alliance

Slo­va­kia, under Prime Min­is­ter Robert Fico, has emerged as a key actor aligned with the Glob­al Nation­al Con­ser­v­a­tive Alliance (GNCA), shar­ing ide­o­log­i­cal com­mit­ments to nation­al sov­er­eign­ty and oppo­si­tion to EU insti­tu­tions while main­tain­ing deep eco­nom­ic ties with Rus­sia. Fico’s SMER-SD par­ty secured near­ly 23% in the Sep­tem­ber 2023 par­lia­men­tary elec­tion, with rhetoric mir­ror­ing Krem­lin nar­ra­tives that chal­lenged Ukraine’s sov­er­eign­ty and pro­posed halt­ing Slo­vak mil­i­tary sup­port. Fol­low­ing his return to pow­er, Fico moved to lift sanc­tions against Jozef Ham­bálek, an indi­vid­ual with ties to Russ­ian intel­li­gence and neo-Nazi groups, while Slo­vak Pres­i­dent Zuzana Čaputová warned his gov­ern­men­t’s for­eign pol­i­cy could resem­ble “Vik­tor Orbán-type” approaches.

The GNCA oper­ates through CPAC con­fer­ences in Budapest that bring togeth­er Euro­pean far-right lead­ers with Amer­i­can con­ser­v­a­tives under Hun­gary’s coor­di­na­tion. Vik­tor Orbán, Her­bert Kickl, and Andrej Babiš signed the Patri­ot­ic Man­i­festo in June 2024, cre­at­ing Patri­ots for Europe as the Euro­pean Par­lia­men­t’s third-largest group with 84 seats, pro­mot­ing “Make Europe Great Again.” Slo­va­ki­a’s infor­ma­tion space has been infil­trat­ed through sub­tler means since 2014, lever­ag­ing embassies, col­lab­o­ra­tors, and social media to paint Rus­sia as a vic­tim and pro­tec­tor of tra­di­tion­al val­ues, with a GLOBSEC poll indi­cat­ing declin­ing per­cent­ages of Slo­vaks who believe Rus­sia is respon­si­ble for invad­ing Ukraine.

Slo­va­ki­a’s eco­nom­ic align­ment with GNCA posi­tions remains sub­stan­tial. Hun­gary and Slo­va­kia togeth­er paid Rus­sia $13 bil­lion for oil between Feb­ru­ary 2022 and the end of 2024, despite EU efforts to phase out Russ­ian imports. Both nations deep­ened their Russ­ian ener­gy depen­dence rather than diver­si­fy­ing, with Slo­va­kia main­tain­ing near-total reliance on Russ­ian crude oil through the Druzh­ba pipeline while pos­sess­ing tech­ni­cal capac­i­ty to use alter­na­tive Croa­t­ian infra­struc­ture. This part­ner­ship reflects broad­er GNCA ide­ol­o­gy that pri­or­i­tizes nation­al sov­er­eign­ty and oppo­si­tion to supra­na­tion­al gov­er­nance over col­lec­tive Euro­pean secu­ri­ty arrangements.

Exter­nal References:

• Fico: Social­ists Are Now the “Par­ty of Homo­sex­u­als and War­mon­gers” | The Euro­pean Conservative
• Play­ing for Time: Pres­sure Mounts on Hun­gary, Slo­va­kia to Cut Russ­ian Ener­gy Ties | Balkan Insight
• Hun­gary has alter­na­tive ener­gy options but choos­es to rely on Rus­sia — Atlantic Council

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