The Latvian MEP Tatjana Zdanoka, ally of the Catalan independence movement, she collaborated for two decades with the Federal Security Service (FSB) of Russia, according to a journalistic investigation that collects the emails exchanged between the politician and her links in Moscowfor example to organize face-to-face meetings or to report on the initiatives adopted to disseminate pro-Russian messages.

The investigation, published this Monday by ‘The Insider’ magazine and in which other media outlets from the Baltic and Nordic countries participate, reveals that Zdanoka has been an asset of Russian Intelligence since at least 2004., when he began to maintain contacts with a veteran FSB member identified as Dimitri Gladey. She would be her liaison until 2013, when the MEP started talking to another agent, Sergei Beltiukov.

The MEP even asked for money to finance her political work, both in Latvia and in the European Parliament. According to the investigation, on at least one occasion she requested funds for a rally in which he wanted to commemorate the victory of the Soviet Army in World War II.

Zdanoka has claimed that he knows “thousands of people” and, although he has said that he has no contacts with a person named Beltiukov – he could have used a code name – he has confirmed that he saw Gladey for the first time. in the early seventies”, during some ski lessons. He has clarified, however, that he is not aware that he is a Russian spy.

Zdanoka, whose family is of Russian origin, appears as a non-attached MP in the European Chamber, after she was removed from the Greens/European Free Alliance group for her questioned defense of Russian policies. For the vice president of the group, Alice Bah Kuhnke, the information that has now emerged is “terrible” but “does not come as a surprise,” as she declared to ‘The Insider’, a media outlet founded by a Russian opponent.

The MEP has publicly supported Catalan pro-independence politicians and has held meetings in Brussels with several of them, including the leader of ERC, Oril Junqueras, after he had been pardoned. She also questioned on her day the imprisonment of the current general coordinator of EH Bildu, Arnaldo Otegi.

Furthermore, in February 2022, he led the mission of MEPs to examine the situation in the Mar Menor, in Murcia, and meet with authorities and organizations in the area.