Valdai Club

There is also the Valdai Club, which is not a European-based think-tank, but has as one of its chief roles to intensely develop contacts with Western scholars who the Kremlin thinks may have some sympathies for the Kremlin. Regular Valdai attendees have included such well known European speakers as the research director of the German-Russian Forum Alexander Rahr, the former president of the Czech Republic Vaclav Klaus, and Kent University professor Richard Sakwa, among others. Some of them have publicly argued for a softer Western stance on Russia and claimed that Russia’s role in Ukraine is more defensible than often thought in the West, which has become a matter of debate in international academic circles.

Read more on http://www.ponarseurasia.org/memo/russian-world-post-truth-and-europe