MEP Roberta Metsola said the European Parliament, of which she chairs, was subject to “a sophisticated cyberattack” claimed by a proKremlin group.
“Our IT experts [tecnologia da informação] fight and protect our systems. This after we declared Russia a state sponsor of terrorism,” Metsola wrote in a Twitter postand ends with a greeting in Ukrainian.
The speaker’s announcement was made at 12:45 p.m. Brasilia time. At around 2 p.m. the website of the European Parliament was unavailable.
Metsola has not made it clear whether the group identified as Russian or simply as a proVladimirPutin regime in Russia.
Attack comes on a day of revenge against Russia in the European Parliament. As Metsola pointed out, MEPs today approved a text calling Russia a “state sponsor of terrorism” in the Ukraine war and called on the 27 European Union (EU) countries to do the same.
In the text, adopted in Strasbourg by 494 votes in favor (58 against and 44 abstentions), MEPs describe that Russia is not only a “state sponsor of terrorism” but also “uses terrorist tools”.
Volodymir Zelensky, President of Ukraine, welcomed the resolution. “Russia must be isolated at all levels and held accountable for its longstanding policy of terror in Ukraine and around the world,” he wrote on Twitter.
What is the European Parliament? The European Union legislature consists of 705 MEPs elected every five years by the citizens of the bloc countries. The last elections were held in 2019, the next ones are scheduled for 2024.
Parliament works with other bodies of the European Union, such as the European Commission which is seen as the executive that proposes laws and carries them out on behalf of the bloc as a whole and the Council of the European Union, which brings together ministers from member countries to Discuss strategies, positions and proposals.
*With information from AFP; Text in update