Slovakia's prime minister injured in shooting
Slovakia's populist prime minister shot in assassination attempt, shocking Europe before elections
Update: He has been stabilized at the hospital and is expected to recover.
Update:
What's the over/under on the attempted assassin being Russian?
Actually Fico ran on the pledge to stop Slovakian military aid to Ukraine.
“Populist” means far right Russian stooge these days.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66972984
"If (Fico’s party) Smer enters government, we will not send a single round of ammunition to Ukraine," (Fico) recently told supporters. (Before the election, which Smer won)
Most of Eastern European politics can be boiled down to "Pro-western elitists vs. pro-russian populists"
So anyone can be behind that assassination attempt, even pro-Russians as a false flag. Poor fucker shouldn't have taken the money
Zero....his electoral platform was basically "stop helping Ukraine".
There's no upside for an independent Russian resident of Slovakia to be a provocateur and potentially kill their ally, and nothing would reinvigorate weakening Western support for Ukraine than the Russian state attempting to assassinate a European head of state.
So about that... Gunman Who Shot Slovak PM Linked to Pro-Russian Extremist Group
Wouldn't be the first time I assumed wrong, but I'm going to wait for better sourcing than the Kyiv Post for this particular story.
They have an existential rational for blaming Russia, as well as an obligation to feed the propaganda narrative for their ongoing war. That's not a criticism as that's what is required of them at this moment, but it's an acknowledgement of why I will wait for additional reporting that isn't sourced from Ukraine, or a single Hungarian journalist on Twitter.
Edit: Look, a different article with different sourcing that points in a different direction. Either way, this situation will take time to get an accurate accounting of what actually happened, and why.
That is a possibility as a Russian would not care much for Slovakia and try to break unity in the west.
My first thought too. Putin is cleaning house internally. And this can just be a good move with fico not being loyal enough so you martyr him and get an even more usefull idiot in his place.
