Yes, no one in Europe hides the fact that a significant part of the new left since the 1960s are Maoists; No conspiracy theory here.
I wrote about it a lot on the channel.
All "green" parties generally grew out of Maoism when, in 1978, they became disillusioned with Deng Xiaoping's reforms ("betrayal of Maoism").
Hence, by the way, the beastly hatred of the Chinese Maoists, first for the Soviet Union, and then for Russia.
As for Mélenchon, he grew out of Trotskyism (he was a member of the leading Trotskyist party in France in the 1970s). But Melenchon's circle, as the French media write, is full of Maoists.
By the way, in this screenshot we see that the famous "1968" in France was exactly Maoist in spirit, with portraits of Mao.
At the same time, the "Cultural Revolution" took place in China, in Europe they imitated the Red Guard, even with the same slogan "Don't trust anyone over 30", but still the cultural baggage of the Europeans did not reach the level of killing people because of glasses.
Another question is whether the current European Maoists are Chinese spies? In the 1960s and 1970s, they were openly Chinese foreign agents, operating with their own money and under their own instructions. Are there ever ex-spies? This is probably a better question to ask.