Vucic’s trip should be seen less as defying the EU and more as furthering his self-interests.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic confirmed that he’ll defy the EU by traveling to Moscow for Victory Day after the bloc warned officials from candidate countries like his not to participate in that event. This is a brave move for which he deserves applause but doesn’t compensate for him removing Deputy Prime Minister Aleksandar Vulin from the government under what TASS’ source claimed was Western pressure. Vulin had recently fallen further afoul of Brussels than ever before due to some of his rhetoric.
He visited Moscow last month to meet with Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, during which time he blamed the US deep state and unnamed European intelligence agencies for orchestrating the latest protests that he characterized as a Color Revolution. He also accused the bloc of fueling regional conflicts in an attempt to restore its lost influence and reaffirmed that Serbia won’t sanction Russia. These statements and other related ones led to the EU unsuccessfully trying to impose sanctions against him.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov reacted to the aforesaid attempt by accusing the bloc of “departing from the very standards of democracy they have long proclaimed and sought to impart to other nations, including us.” After Vulin was removed from the government during its latest reshuffle, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova condemned the bloc’s interference in Serbia’s domestic affairs, but she also suggested that mutually beneficially cooperation will continue in spite of that.
Russia had also lent credence to Vucic and Vulin’s claims that the latest protests were a Color Revolution, which Vulin said that it helped Serbia thwart, alongside dispatching FSB experts to investigate the opposition’s allegations that the authorities used a so-called “sonic weapon” to quell the unrest. From the Kremlin’s perspective, Serbia is a fraternal Slavic country with a shared history of fighting on the same side in the two World Wars, and Moscow also appreciates its rejection of Western sanctions.
About that, Serbia is unlikely to ever sanction Russia since that would amount to major self-inflicted harm to its economy and possibly prompt spontaneous protests from the country’s majority Russian-friendly population, both due to the economic damage this would cause and for principle’s sake. Nevertheless, with Vulin abruptly removed from the Serbian government despite his nearly 13 consecutive years of service in a variety of positions, political ties might inevitably weaken.
That’s because he’s a sincere Russophile who Moscow trusted to ensure the endurance of their strategic partnership under Western pressure. This was understood by Vucic, who elevated Vulin within his many governments partially for that purpose, yet Vucic just gave in to Western pressure by totally removing Vulin from his latest government and thus possibly ending his political career. Despite Zakharova’s rhetoric, which is to be expected from a diplomat of her caliber, the Kremlin certainly isn’t happy.
Putin is therefore likely planning to discuss this with Vucic during his trip to Moscow to commemorate Victory Day in order to investigate how he views the future of their partnership. These talks might be one of the real reasons why Vucic is traveling there together with fulfilling his moral obligation as Serbia’s leader and scoring political points at home. Considering this, Vucic’s trip should be seen less as defying the EU and more as furthering his self-interests, but it’s still important that he’s going.
Source: author’s blog
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