French far-right leader Marine Le Pen visited her Bulgarian allies in Sofia on Friday along with other members of the EU parliament’s Movement for a Europe of Nations and Freedom Alliance.
Speaking to Euronews, Le Pen dismissed suggestions of a rift with Italy’s Interior Minister Matteo Salvini who is recruiting members for the far-right EU group.
“It is not just a relationship of political collaboration, Matteo is a friend, he is a man of great loyalty, of great will that has shown in a just a few months that the political will can do anything.
“They say up to now that they cannot control the migration problem, but he said yes we can control it and he controlled it in Italy,” she said.
Le Pen also criticised French president Emmanuel Macron’s alleged lack of coalition building ahead of the European elections
“Emmanuel Macron who presented himself as a leader in Europe. His movement is not moving at all, he doesn’t meet anyone, he doesn’t visit any country, we don’t even know with whom finally he will form a coalition in the European Parliament.”
Le Pen was in Bulgaria visiting her far-right allies from Volya party and attended a rally of the Bulgarian far-right party along with Gerolf Annemans, the president of the EU political group to which Le Pen belongs to.
Other members include Italy’s The League, Austria’s Freedom Party, and Greece’s Golden Dawn.