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Much has been written about how Turkey uses mosques, imams and associations to influence religious and cultural life in Europe. Not enough has been written on Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's plan to support emerging political parties in Europe.

Bulgaria. The Turkish President has just received a delegation from the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF), an important party in Bulgaria. This occurred on Sunday, June 6th. Erdogan was accompanied by the Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu and by representatives of his party. The MRF won 20 percent of the votes in the European elections and 10 percent in the national ones.

Sweden. In August 2019, Mikail Yüksel, a Swedish politician of Turkish origin, founded a new party called "Nyans". Accused of connections with the Gray Wolves, of which his father is a member, and coalition partner of Erdogan's AKP, today Yüksel wants to enter parliament in Stockholm. In addition to the links with Islamists already known in Sweden, such as the former Minister for Construction Mehmet Kaplan and the activist Yasri Khan (former Green Party), the Nyans platform wants to see to it that "Islamophobia" is punished.

"We want Islamophobia to be declared a crime, we want Muslims to be recognized as a minority in the constitution," Yüksel told the Turkish pro-government newspaper Daily Sabah. Nyans has a very good chance of gaining political representation and will start with participation in the elections of 2022.

The Netherlands. Denk, the party founded by Tunahan Kuzu and Selçuk Öztürk, brought three deputies to the Dutch Parliament in March 2021. The party does not hide its affinity with Turkey: criticisms of Turkey are taboo as well as their refusal to talk about the Armenian genocide. Dutch journalist Kleis Jager summarizes the Dutch pro Erdogan party in Le Figaro as follows: “In Rotterdam, where one fifth of the voters are Muslims, an Islamic party has been created which defends the Dutch of Turkish origin and propagates Erdogan's ideas. This party fully supports Erdogan's policies, is almost exclusively interested in issues related to the Turkish community and intervenes very little outside these issues. He specifically campaigned for the founding of Turkish schools in the Netherlands. The party proposes a left-wing economic policy, but its speech is extremely targeted: it denounces practically only Islamophobia and hostility towards immigrant communities.”

France. Nagib Azergui has just founded the Union of Muslim Democrats of France (UDMF), which presents eight lists in the regional elections at the end of June. The slogan speaks volumes about the party's intentions: "All united against Islamophobia." The party has nominated members of a former Erdogan-linked list. The weekly Marianne in an investigation called it "the trojan horse of political Islam".

Europe these days was busy talking with Erdogan at NATO’s summit. It must awaken instead and fight this Turkish attempt to infiltrate by way of its democracies.