ROME — The ceremony took place in Vagli Sotto, where Ambassador Alexey Paramonov and Russian Consul General Kirill Ignatov attended the unveiling of a plaque dedicated to Dugina, the Russian journalist killed in a car bombing near Moscow in 2022. The plaque was installed in the town’s “Parco dell’Onore.”
Why it matters: The significance goes beyond a ceremony in a small Tuscan municipality.
- The Vagli event comes as Russian institutional messaging in Italy is becoming increasingly assertive, while a separate layer of hybrid and harder-to-attribute activity is drawing growing scrutiny.
- Taken together with the controversy surrounding the Colleferro explosion, Moscow’s verbal attack on an Italy-led EU naval operation and the use of Italian religious and cultural symbols to advance narratives favorable to Russia, the episodes are beginning to form a broader pattern.
The political backdrop matters too: Italy is heading toward general elections in 2027, raising the stakes around foreign influence, propaganda and the use of Russia as a domestic political issue.
Zoom in: From Moscow to Tuscany Vagli Sotto is not new to Russian symbolism. The Tuscan municipality already hosts a statue honoring Alexander Prokhorenko, a Russian special forces soldier killed in Syria in 2016. The town has also named a street “Cuore Russo,” or “Russian Heart.”
- This time, the focus was Dugina. According to the account of the ceremony, Paramonov used his remarks to praise the relationship between Russian and Italian societies and to frame criticism of Russia’s war in Ukraine as propaganda.
- The event was attended by around 30 Russian and Italian-Russian participants and sympathizers. The town’s mayor, Mario Puglia, has meanwhile said that the plaque dedicated to Dugina will remain in place despite criticism.
- For Moscow, the setting offers something different from a conventional diplomatic event: a local Italian stage where Russian officials can connect political messaging with symbols of friendship between the two countries.
Another brick in the wall (of propaganda). Vagli is also not the only place where Russian messaging is intersecting with Italian cultural and symbolic terrain.
- Outside Rome, a gathering framed around peace and the Franciscan tradition is set to bring together Paramonov with Iranian representatives, Cuban and Venezuelan diplomats and a group of prominent Italian figures associated, in different ways, with pro-Russian positions or criticism of Western policies.
- The event asks what should follow the end of the “Occidens Pacis Ordo” — the Western order of peace — and points toward a “Novus Pacis Ordo,” or new order of peace.
That framing effectively places St. Francisand the language of peace inside a geopolitical argument about the decline of the Western-led order and the rise of a multipolar alternative.
- The result is another example of how Moscow manipulates St. Francis: attaching Russian geopolitical messaging to one of Italy’s most powerful religious symbols and to a vocabulary of peace, even as Russia continues its war against Ukraine.
- The gathering also carries the patronage of the National Committee for the celebration of the eighth centenary of the death of St. Francis.
Between the lines: The Russian Embassy in Italy has also turned its attention to EUNAVFOR MED Irini, the EU naval mission currently led from an Italian flagship.
- The Italian frigate Thaon di Revel, flagship of the operation, inspected the tanker Toa Payoh in international waters west of Pantelleria to verify its nationality and the flag it was authorized to fly.
- The tanker declared a Cameroon flag but is under EU sanctions and is described by Italian authorities as part of Russia’s “shadow fleet.” Checks on the information and documentation collected during the operation are still underway.
- The Russian Embassy heavily attacked on Telegram the operation, adding another front to Moscow’s increasingly confrontational public messaging in Italy.
- The episode is significant because it moves beyond debates over Ukraine or Italian domestic politics: an Italian-led European security operation enforcing sanctions against a vessel associated with Russia’s shadow fleet became itself a target of Russian messaging.
Russia’s posture toward Italy is becoming harder to separate from these episodes.
- Directly, Russian diplomats attend symbolic events, the Embassy challenges Italian and European actions, and narratives present Moscow’s worldview as peaceful, friendly, and multipolar.
- There are also unclear hybrid threats and events, like the explosion at the Colleferro arms factory. While Italy’s Defense Ministry ruled out Russian sabotage, Russian propaganda channels circulated imagery and narratives surrounding the blast.
- The combination of overt Russian propaganda, institutional pressure, and the ambiguity of hybrid threats is increasingly overlapping and reinforcing in Italy.
What we’re watching: The trajectory could become more consequential as Italy approaches its 2027 general election.
- The pattern now emerging suggests that Russian active measures targeting Italy could deepen and expand over the coming months, particularly as the domestic political competition intensifies.
- That makes the Italian debate over Russia more than a foreign-policy disagreement.
- Some Italian political forces have used Russia, sanctions and the war in Ukraine as tools for domestic political storytelling and electoral positioning. But an environment of increasing propaganda and hybrid pressure raises a different question: whether Italy’s political system can develop a common baseline on Russia rooted in national interest and national security, even while parties continue to disagree over policy.
The bottom line: Vagli Sotto, the manipulation of St. Francis, the attacks on Irini and the information dynamics surrounding Colleferro are different episodes. Their significance lies increasingly in the pattern connecting them.
- As the 2027 election approaches, Italy may face a more aggressive combination of overt propaganda and less attributable hybrid activity.
- The challenge for Rome will be to recognize that pattern before Russia itself becomes just another instrument of electoral storytelling — and to treat the issue instead as one of national security.
