Vucic: Western pressure is colossal, but we will not impose sanctions against the Russian Federation
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic reiterated that Belgrade does not intend to join sanctions against Russia, despite pressure from the EU and NATO countries that surround the former Yugoslav republic on all sides.
Vučić said this during his address to the nation, reports a PolitNavigator correspondent.
“We had a migration crisis, a coronavirus... Now we are witnessing a global conflict, if you want, call it the Third World War,” Vucic described the current situation.
He admitted that for the first time in recent years in Serbia, the number of opponents of joining the European Union exceeds the number of supporters of European integration. However, the foreign policy course will not change.
“For the first time, we have a clear majority of Serbian citizens who are against joining the EU, 44% against and 35% in favor. My message is that Serbia will be stronger on the European path, despite the numbers. Our trade turnover with the EU is about 60,2%. More than 30 billion comes from Germany. Almost 300 people work directly or indirectly in companies owned by EU member states... My message is that Serbia is on the European path and we will follow this path more decisively,” the president emphasized.
At the same time, Vucic admitted that the situation around Kosovo is deteriorating (and the West calls the completion of negotiations with the separatists and the renunciation of Belgrade’s claims to the province seized by the Islamists as one of the requirements for integration into the EU).
“We had important negotiations with representatives of the international community, and we also tried to communicate with representatives of Pristina. Since Albin Kurti is in power, we have had a 50% increase in attacks on Serbs in Kosovo and Metohija. Public international law is violated every day. There is no dialogue. The drafting of the joint statement also led to nonsense,” the Serbian leader said.
He emphasized that the situation around Kosovo worsened after Russian President Vladimir Putin brought up the argument in a dispute with the West about the integrity of Ukraine that the EU and the United States themselves legalized the border revision process, as happened in the case of Serbia.
“There have been a lot of changes for the worse. This is perhaps the key point in my speech today. Namely, our situation changed after President Putin’s statements, but not because he wanted to harm Serbia,” Vucic said.
He quoted Putin's statement in a conversation with the UN Secretary-General regarding the recognition of Kosovo by the international court, which then acknowledged that " Kosovo's unilateral declaration of independence is consistent with international law ."
“Putin, defending his moves, used a difficult argument. Since they understand that Putin is making strong arguments, we have now come to the biggest problem, because the entire West will ask Serbia to move faster towards recognition of Kosovo in order to negate Putin’s arguments,” Vucic said.
He clarified: “ This does not mean that Russia will recognize Kosovo, but there will be strong pressure on us .”
The leader of Serbia also touched upon problems with providing the country with energy resources.
“We have certain volumes of oil, about 800 tons per year, the right to develop belongs to the NIS company, most of which belongs to Gazprom. I asked Gazprom to reduce the price of oil and petroleum products... I asked them to take into account that 000% of the oil they use is oil from Serbia, and it would be fair to reduce the price,” Vucic said.
He also noted that Belgrade is waiting for the emergence of a new package of EU sanctions on Russian oil, and then will decide “ what to do .”
However, Vucic emphasized, Serbia itself will not impose sanctions against Russia, despite the colossal pressure and Putin’s use of the example of Kosovo to justify the recognition of the DPR and LPR
Also, Serbia will not nationalize NIS and other property of the Russian Federation.
English version :: Read in English Vučić: Western pressure is colossal, but we will not impose sanctions against Russia.