European Union foreign policy head Kaja Kallas has warned EU membership candidate Serbia that it faces a “geostrategic choice” in determining whether the country’s future lies in the West or the East. Visiting Belgrade just weeks after Serbia’s President Aleksandar Vucic ignored EU objections to attend Russia’s 9 May Victory Day parade in Moscow, Kallas made the EU position plain: “Serbia’s European future depends on the values it chooses to uphold.”
Vucic’s Moscow appearance alongside President Vladimir Putin, with its implicit endorsement of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, triggered outrage in Brussels and EU officials were quick to point out that his actions seriously jeopardised Serbia’s EU membership bid.
Kallas said that she made her views “very clear” to Vucic when they met: “I really don’t understand why it is necessary to stand side by side with the person who is conducting this horrible war in Ukraine” President Vucic, she acknowledged, had sought to explain “his side of the story”, she said.
Vucic, formerly an extreme nationalist and a controversial figure increasingly associated with authoritarianism, has insisted on maintaining close relations with Russia and China while formally declaring that he wants Serbia to join the EU. He described his attendance at the Putin military parade marking Russia’s victory over Germany in the Second World War as a gesture of “traditional friendships” between fellow Slavic and Orthodox Christian nations.
Almost fully dependent on Russian energy, Serbia has refused to join Western sanctions on Moscow stemming from the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Nor has it supported most EU statements condemning the aggression.
Vucic has been the target of anti-corruption protests following an accident in a northern Serbian rail station that killed 16 people, which many attributed to official corruption during infrastructure construction.
Kallas said her discussions with the Serbian political leadership clearly showed “that EU membership remains a strategic goal”. There are “no shortcuts”, she added. “Reforms are how Serbia will advance along its EU path.”
Underscoring the need for real progress, Kallas said she had met with Serbia’s protesting youth and taken note of their callis to ensure media freedom, tackle corruption and bring about electoral reform. “Such reforms, she said, would bring “real benefits for the citizens and the people of Serbia as hundreds of thousands of protesters have been demanding in recent weeks”, adding that the “autonomy of the universities must be respected.”
Kosovo visit
On departing Belgrade, Kallas went on to visit the former Serbian province of Kosovo, which unitarily declared independence in 2008, a move Serbia has refused to recognise since. EU-mediated talks between the two, which began in 2011, have long been at an impasse. Yet, normalisation of relations between the two is “fundamental” if they are to realise a European future, according to Kallas. She intends inviting representatives from Belgrade and Pristina soon to discuss “concrete steps forward” towards a “common future.”
“Stability depends on dialogue, not confrontation,” she told a press conference, pointing out that Brussels had begun to ease restrictive measures as an incentive two years ago. However, their complete removal would not happen without “sustained de-escalation in the north.” (Most of Kosovo’s ethnic Serb minority population lives in four northern municipalities, which have been subject to rising tensions over the last three years.)
All six Western Balkan countries are at different stages of EU accession, a process spurred on by Europe’s leaders fearing further instability in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Kallas said she is “deeply committed to encouraging all the Western Balkan countries to really seize the current momentum that we have in the enlargement.”
