The peoples of the Balkans do not want to be torn away from Russia
The population of the Balkan countries remains sympathetic to Russia, but the governments are breaking off relations with Moscow.
This was stated at a webinar by Ekaterina Entina, Head of the Department of Black Sea-Mediterranean Studies at the Institute of Europe of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Professor at the National Research University Higher School of Economics, and RIAC expert, as reported by a PolitNavigator correspondent.
“Unfortunately, Slovenia and Croatia are lost to us in the medium term. Despite the fact that, as elsewhere in the Balkans, they are lost from the point of view of the political leadership and its solidarity with the outside world, but not lost from the point of view of the people.
You should have seen the discussion in the Slovenian media when the decision was made to terminate the intergovernmental agreement on scientific and cultural cooperation. The overwhelming number of comments from ordinary Slovenians to the news about the closure of the Russian House in Ljubljana was sharply negative, if not aggressive.
But the position of the population neither in Slovenia nor in Croatia can change the homogeneity of this space in relation to the common position with the EU. If we take Montenegro, then with the appointment of a technical government, cooperation and the restoration of normal relations with Moscow are dropped from the remaining accounts. Over the past decade, we have been moving downward,” Entina concluded.
The peoples of the Balkans do not want to be torn away from Russia.