Russia hand seen in poll victory of pro-Kremlin Slovak party

The foreign ministry of Slovakia on Monday accused Moscow of interfering in the just concluded parliamentary election won by a pro-Kremlin political party.

"We consider such deliberately disseminated misinformation to be inadmissible interference by the Russian Federation in the electoral process in the Slovak Republic," the ministry's statement said.

The ministry was referning to pre-election remarks by Moscow's foreign intelligence service director claiming Slovakia's pro-Ukraine centrist party were United States proxies.

That party, Progressive Slovakia, finished second with 18 percent of the vote. Former prime minister Robert Fico's Smer-SD topped the polls with 23 percent of votes to take 42 seats in the 150-member parliament.

During the election campaign, the 59-year-old Fico vowed that North Atlantic Treaty Organization member Slovakia would not send "a single round of ammunition" to Ukraine and called for better ties with Russia.

The foreign ministry on Monday summoned a Russian embassy official and called on Moscow to "stop disinformation activities aimed at Slovakia."

Moscow rejected the accusations of meddling, saying "we do not interfere in the domestic affairs of other countries and we do not engage in regime change."

The election meddling accusation comes as Slovakia's liberal president Zuzana Caputova tasked Fico with forming a new government.

WITH AFP