Heinz-Christian Strache, the leader of the Freedom Party, announced that he had signed the agreement with Putin’s own United Russia party on his Facebook page, The New York Times reported on Monday. The announcement also mentioned that Strache had visited Flynn a few weeks earlier in Trump Tower. The cooperation agreement itself includes plans for collaboration between United Russia and the Freedom Party on economic, business, and political projects over the next five years.

Founded in the 1950s by former Nazis, the Freedom Party nearly captured the Austrian presidency (which is largely ceremonial) in May but lost a runoff election on Dec. 4. It nevertheless remains a potent force in Austrian politics, where it leads all opinions polls ahead of the two mainstream parties, and is best known for its hardline stance against immigration and its defensiveness toward Russia. Indeed, Russia’s signatory Sergei Zheleznyak identified Europe’s “migration crisis” as one of the key areas where the two parties could work together.

Not surprisingly, the Freedom Party has opposed the economic sanctions imposed against Russia for its imperialist activities in the Crimea and Ukraine.

The Freedom Party’s stance on Russia deserves particular attention for what it implies about the future not only of Russia and Austria, but the entire world of liberal democratic nations. According to the doctrine of Alexander Dugin, a Russian fascist intellectual whose 1997 book “Foundations of Geopolitics” and 2009 book “The Fourth Political Theory” provide an ideological template for both Putin and Russia’s military and political elite. Dubbing his theory “Eurasianism,” Dugin argued that Russia is an exceptional civilization due to being a hybrid of both Europe and Asia culturally and geographically, but insists that liberalism, democracy, and pluralism must be purged from Russian culture — and, notably, that Russia needs to become the world’s premiere superpower by reviving the Soviet empire and controlling other nations by proxy through sympathetic far right politicians.