Nigel Farage's near monthly appearances on state-owned Russia Today have come under scrutiny after his expression of admiration for Vladimir Putin this week.

In one of his 17 appearances on the channel seen by the Guardian and transmitted since December 2010, he claims Europe is governed not by elected democracies but instead "by the worst people we have seen in Europe since 1945".

The Ukip leader has appeared so frequently that he is cited in literature for the TV station Russia Today as one of their special and "endlessly quotable" British guests. "He has been known far longer to the RT audience than most of the British electorate," Russia Today claims.

The Ukip leader did not issue a word of criticism of Russian democracy in any of the Russia Today interviews viewed by the Guardian. Last August he told the channel that British intervention in Libya and Syria would go ahead regardless of any vote in the UN, and said he was still not sure President Bashar al-Assad had used chemical weapons.

Farage's relationship with Russia has been under the spotlight since his comments last week on Ukraine. In a TV debate with Nick Clegg (pictured above) he said Russia had been provoked and that the EU had blood on its hands for trying to force Ukraine to choose between itself and Russia. The Lib Dem leader is expected to challenge Farage further on the subject in a second debate, this time for the BBC, on Wednesday.

Chris Bryant, the former Labour Europe minister, said: "One of the most stupid adages for politicians to believe is my enemy's enemy is my friend. Putin closes down the free press, jails journalists with impunity and has enriched himself beyond the dreams of Imelda Marcos and has territorial ambitions. Farage is rapidly becoming the Berlusconi of Britain."

Russia Today was set up in 2005 by the Russian government as a 24-hour news programme and has been accused of being a propaganda tool of Putin. Earlier this year one anchor, Liz Wahl, quit on air, saying the channel always wanted extremist voices hostile to the west.

In many of his lengthy interviews Farage predicted the breakup of Europe, adding that EU leaders "are not undemocratic. They are anti-democratic. These are very bad and dangerous people They are the worst people we have seen in Europe since 1945". In another interview he claimed "they are the most dangerous people in Europe for 70 years".

His interviews, and warnings of the EU's imminent collapse, are often conducted against a backdrop of footage of police suppressing anti-austerity riots.

He also suggests that the EU is likely to attack other countries in the Middle East, such as Bahrain and Yemen, following the intervention in Libya. He said: "International law itself is not going to stop the British and the French and, perhaps, the Americans, if they choose to do something."

He also agreed with his interviewer that the attack was largely due to a need to capture oil supplies, and agreed that the western attack will lead to collateral damage.

Asked why so few British politicians opposed the attack in Libya he says: "What we've got in the House of Commons is a political class – they all go to the same schools, get the same jobs in research, spend their lives in politics and have never had a job in the real world. So when it comes to it, they all vote like sheep. We do not have enough independent thinkers sitting in the House of Commons preparing to think of counterarguments".

Before the Syrian vote he told Russian TV: "Probably, there are stronger hatreds between some of the opposition groups than there are against the Assad regime." He said it was probable Assad had used chemical weapons but added: "We ought to be slightly cautious and we ought to absolutely make sure that it was Assad who used those weapons."

Either way he opposed the use of force saying: "I have to say that ever since Tony Blair's time, starting off with Bosnia, we seem to go in for foreign wars with alarming regularity, often having no really clear objectives or any idea how we are going to withdraw. Just to prove that point – we've now been in Afghanistan for longer than the first and the second world wars added up together."

In March last year he advised viewers to disinvest from banks and property in the EU after the Cypriot bailout. He said: "Don't invest in the eurozone. Do not invest anywhere in eurozone. You've got to be mad to do so, because it's now run by people who don't respect democracy, who don't respect the rule of law, who don't respect the basic principles upon which western civilisation is supposed to be based."

The frequency of his attacks on European economic and foreign policy has drawn him to the attention of the Russian deputy foreign affairs minister, Alexander Yakovenko: the two men met in May last year.

Farage caused surprise at the weekend when asked by GQ magazine which politician he most admired. He replied: "As an operator, but not as a human being, I would say [Vladimir] Putin." He defended his approach at a Chatham House event in London. He pointed out: "I said I don't like him, I wouldn't trust him and I wouldn't want to live in his country, but compared with the kids who run foreign policy in this country, I've more respect for him than our lot."

Clegg said: "I just think it is utterly grotesque that Nigel Farage apparently admires – and that was the question to him: 'Who do you admire?' – admires someone, Vladimir Putin, who has been the chief sponsor and protector of one of the most brutal dictators on the face of the planet, President Assad [of Syria]."

Farage is hardly likely to be personally sympathetic to Putin's politics, but the confluence of the two men's dislike for the European Union has made Farage a desirable figure for Russian state-run broadcasters.

Farage's views on the EU's role in the Ukraine are shared by some Tory Eurosceptic MPs. In a Bruges Group film on how the EU has blundered in the Ukraine, John Redwood says: "The EU seems to be flexing its words in a way that Russia finds worrying and provokes Russia into flexing its military muscles."