# Putin hosts Slovakia’s Robert Fico in an unannounced Kremlin meeting
Event date: 2024-12-22
Russian President Vladimir Putin met Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico at the Kremlin in a visit that had not been previously announced, according to reporting cited by The Moscow Times from Russian television.
The meeting matters because it brought together the Russian leader and one of the few European Union and NATO heads of government who has remained publicly friendly with Moscow since Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine began. The Kremlin did not disclose the trip in advance, and Russian spokesman Dmitry Peskov said it had been arranged only a few days earlier.
Peskov did not provide a detailed agenda, but he suggested that supplies of Russian gas could have been part of the discussion. That possibility is important in context: Ukraine has said it will not renew a contract that allows Russian gas to transit its territory after Dec. 31, creating concern in Slovakia and Hungary, both of which rely on Russian energy.
Fico returned to office in October 2023 and quickly ended military aid to Ukraine. His position has often aligned more closely with that of Hungary’s Viktor Orban than with many other EU leaders, especially on calls for peace talks rather than deeper support for Kyiv.
The Kremlin encounter adds another data point to Fico’s unusually direct engagement with Moscow. The trip was notable not just for its secrecy but for the optics: a sitting prime minister of an EU and NATO state entering the Kremlin at a moment when relations between Russia and most of Europe remain deeply strained.
For Slovakia, the issue is not symbolic alone. Energy supply has become a serious political and economic question as the end of the transit deal approaches. If Russian gas stops moving through Ukraine, countries that depend on that route may have to adjust quickly. That makes any discussion between Fico and Putin potentially consequential, even if the public details are thin.
The reporting also noted that Fico had already said in November that he planned to travel to Moscow in May for ceremonies marking the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II. Monday’s unannounced Kremlin meeting shows that contact is already happening well before that scheduled visit.
The Moscow Times report makes clear that the visit was known first through Russian television commentary and Telegram posts by Kremlin insider Pavel Zarubin rather than through a formal announcement. That detail underlines how the meeting came into public view: not through a standard diplomatic communique, but through the informal channels often used to signal Kremlin activity.
Whatever else was discussed, the image of Fico and Putin meeting privately in the Kremlin will likely be read in European capitals as a sign that Slovakia is pursuing its own channel with Moscow despite the broader EU consensus against normalising ties. At a minimum, it shows that energy pressure and geopolitical positioning remain tightly linked.
The meeting was brief in public description, but broad in implication. It comes at the intersection of war, gas supply and European political fragmentation, with Fico once again standing out as one of the continent’s most Russia-friendly leaders.
