The head of ANO party Andrej Babis had promised to cut aid to Ukraine if he wins<\/p>\n
The right-wing party of agriculture billionaire Andrej Babis, branded \u2018Czech Trump\u2019 by local media, has taken the lead in his country\u2019s parliamentary election.
\nPartial results were released by the Czech Statistical Office several hours after the polls closed across the central European country of 11 million earlier on Saturday.
\nWith ballots from 20% of voting districts counted, Babis\u2019 opposition ANO (Yes) party was ahead with 39.7% of the vote, followed by the Spolu (Together) group led by Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala with 19.1%, the agency said.
\nBabis has been campaigning on a promise to stop Czech military assistance to Kiev, unlike Fiala, who has been a staunch supporter of Ukraine in its conflict with Russia.
\nThe 71-year-old, who served as prime minister between 2017 and 2021, has been particularly critical of Prague\u2019s ammunition initiative for Kiev, calling it \u201coverpriced\u201d and insisting that it should be handled by NATO.<\/p>\n
READ MORE: \u2018Czech Trump\u2019 set to shift Central Europe away from Brussels<\/p>\n
He has spoken out against Ukraine\u2019s membership in the EU, as well as Brussels\u2019 handling of immigration and the Green Deal.
\nThe Western media has warned ahead of the vote that with Hungary and Slovakia already refusing to provide military aid to Kiev and advocating for a diplomatic end to the conflict, Babis\u2019 victory in the Czech Republic could tip Central Europe even further away from Brussels on Ukraine and other key issues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The head of ANO party Andrej Babis had promised to cut aid to Ukraine if he wins The right-wing party of agriculture billionaire Andrej Babis, branded \u2018Czech Trump\u2019 by local…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19691,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19690","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economy","category-environment","category-politics"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t