Almost half of Serbs are against Serbia joining the EU, the vast majority are against joining NATO
Almost half of Serbia's citizens do not support Serbia's accession to the European Union, and the overwhelming majority believe that recognition of the independence of the "Republic of Kosovo" is not worth EU membership, reports a PolitNavigator correspondent.
According to a survey conducted for RT Balkan by the editors of the publication “New Serbian Political Thought”, 47,6% of Serbs do not support Serbia’s accession to the EU, and only a little more than a third of them (35,6%) support European integration.
The main result of this study is that the ratio of supporters and opponents of Serbia's accession to the EU has reversed compared to last year, says Djordje Vukadinovic, editor-in-chief of New Serbian Political Thought. “At the end of last year we conducted a study, and while there were those who were in favor of joining the EU, so many are now against it, and those who were against it are now in favor,” he emphasizes.
However, if the condition for joining the EU had been recognition of the independence of the so-called “Republic of Kosovo”, the results would have been completely different. In this case, 79,2% of respondents would be against Serbia’s accession to the EU, and only 9% would be in favor. “This shows how incomparable the EU and Kosovo are in the minds of Serbian citizens. After all, statehood and identity are one issue, and the second is foreign policy orientation, which can be different,” notes Vukadinovic.
A survey conducted at the end of December 2022 shows that the vast majority of Serbian citizens do not approve of the possibility of their country joining NATO: 83,90% of respondents are against Serbia joining the North Atlantic Alliance, and only 6,2% are in favor. “The attitude towards joining NATO can be said to be a constant, the determination of Serbian citizens is the same as many years ago. I don’t remember when support for joining NATO among Serbs exceeded seven percent,” adds Djordje Vukadinovic.
Respondents were also asked about changes in their standard of living over the past four years. The majority of respondents believe that they live the same (42,3%), 37,2% live worse, and 15,9% of respondents answered that they live better today than four years ago.
As PolitNavigator reported , Aleksandar Vučić acknowledged the error of his policy towards Kosovo over the past 10 years, primarily referring to the transfer of negotiations between Belgrade and Pristina to the EU level.
English version :: Read in English Almost half of Serbs are against Serbia joining the EU, while the overwhelming majority are against joining NATO.