Soros alleged to finance campaign to stop Brexit

By Ahmet Gurhan Kartal

LONDON

U.S. billionaire George Soros is behind a secret plot to reverse Brexit and keep the U.K. a member of the EU, a conservative British daily suggested Thursday.

According to an article by The Telegraph, Soros is “one of the three senior figures linked to the Remain-supporting campaign group Best for Britain” who is currently planning to launch an advertising campaign this month with the hope of a second referendum, potentially to keep the country in the EU.

The group “also plans to target MPs and convince them to vote against the final Brexit deal to trigger another referendum or general election,” according to a strategy document leaked from a meeting of the group, the daily suggested.

The campaign, set to start by the end of February, must “wake the country up and assert that Brexit is not a done deal. That it’s not too late to stop Brexit,” according to a document the daily claimed to have seen.

The campaign group will pressure MPs from 100 constituencies that backed the Remain vote in the 2016 referendum, said The Telegraph.

The article also said that Soros last week met some senior Tory donors in his house in Chelsea and that he has donated £400,000 ($556,000) through his Open Society Foundation.

The strategy document is alleged to have concluded that the movement “must then win the meaningful vote” that Prime Minister Theresa May has pledged on the final Brexit deal and if she loses that vote, “it is likely to trigger a new referendum, or election.”

'Lose-lose proposition'

The daily quoted Soros as saying last year that Brexit was a “lose-lose proposition,” adding that Stephen Peel, from the board of Best for Britain group, “has set out his vision for how Brexit could be overturned by gathering public support with concerts and rallies.”

Soros is known for his role in the collapse of the Eastern Bloc during the Cold War and has been accused of interfering in the domestic affairs of many countries.

He donated $18 billion of his $24.6 billion fortune to the Open Society Foundation, which is alleged to have funded regime change and domestic conflicts in Eastern Europe.

Soros is under fire in his home country Hungary as the anti-immigrant government has accused him of financing various NGOs to bring one million refugees to Europe every year. A series of campaigns target businessmen who are alleged to be aiming at the alleged refugee flow.

The U.K. is set to leave the European Union following a 2016 referendum that saw 52 percent of British voters opt to leave the bloc after 44 years of membership.

The date set for the exit is March 29, 2019.