Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić recently said that citizens recruited by the Wagner Group to fight in Ukraine would be arrested within the jurisdiction of Serbian law enforcement after returning to Serbia. Additionally, he said that friendly countries do not use such recruitment methods. The former Serbian Minister of Foreign Affairs went even further in his criticism of Russia.
“I don’t need the support of the Wagner Group; I don’t need to be applauded or criticized by them,” he said.
In response, the head of the infamous Russian mercenary company Wagner Group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, stated that there are currently no Serbian nationals in his Wagner Group.
“The last one who fought in a Private Military Company left two months ago. If any Serb claimed to have fought for the Wagner Private Military Company in 2023, that is a lie. Don’t trust them,” Prigozhin said, quoted by the Russian regime news agency TASS.
He added that there were no Serbian nationals in the regiments of the Wagner Group for a long time. He guaranteed it had never operated in that country and had no business connection in the region.
However, authorities in Belgrade and some Western and even Serbian media claim that the Wagner Group secretly operates military units in Serbia. Hundreds of pro-Russian and chauvinist activists took to the streets of Belgrade in February. According to the American portal Politico, they have ties to the Wagner Group. Their demand was for Serbia to break off the process of normalizing the political relationship with Kosovo. Belgrade still does not recognize its independence. The European Union is a mediator in negotiations on cooperation. Protesters had banners saying, “Betrayal of Kosovo is a betrayal of Russia!”. They threatened to kill Vučić.
The situation is contradictory because his political group centered around the Serbian Progressive Party came to power itself on the wave of anti-Western and pro-Russian sentiments in Serbia. Over the years, this political party has built its power based on these feelings. He also maintained positive relations with Russia. At the same time, Belgrade is trying to strengthen good ties with China and the European Union. SPP (in Serbian SNS) political group is the official partner of the European People’s Party, the dominant party in the EU, which brings together center-right parties.
Even more anti-Western and pro-Russian attitudes have Serbs living in the Kosovo enclave and Republika Srpska in Bosnia. Just before the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the authorities of Republika Srpska initiated the procedure of leaving Bosnia and Herzegovina, which would violate the Dayton Agreement that ended the bloody war of 1991-95 and seriously threatened peace in the Balkans. How Bosnia events would have developed further if Russia had won in Ukraine is unknown.
Vučic was associated at the beginning of his career with the regime of Slobodan Milošević. He was the Minister of Information from 1998-2000. The Serbian dictator was charged before the tribunal in The Hague with masterminding mass crimes during the wars in the former Yugoslavia (Croatia, Bosnia, and Kosovo). He died during the trial in 2006. Russian propaganda has presented Milošević for many years as a hero unjustly accused and attacked by the West. Serbia was considered a victim of NATO under his leadership. Slobodan Milošević’s brother, Borislav Milošević, was the ambassador in Moscow during his term and remained in Russia after the overthrow of the regime. He returned to his homeland shortly before his death in 2013.
Behind the current demonstrations against the Serbian government is the radically nationalist and populist politician Damjan Knežević, who has declared having ties to the Wagner Group. Vučic accuses those participating in these demonstrations of being anti-Serbian and says they are on the foreign country’s payroll list.
Since the first invasion, Serbian mercenaries appeared in various Russian formations in Ukraine, not necessarily in the Wagner Group. For example, during Putin’s last speech before the joint chambers of parliament in Moscow, observers spotted Bratislav Živkovic, who calls himself the commander of the Chetniks. According to many media reports, he already participated in the first Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2014 in the units of the so-called separatists in the Donbas in Serbia. He also was taking part in activities of extremist nationalist political circles.
The ruling camp in Serbia is regularly accused of being pro-Russian because Serbia has not joined the sanctions against Moscow so far, with a few exceptions. Serbia welcomes with open arms thousands of Russians, including those who flee from being enlisted, relocating their businesses, or just Russian tourists. In recent years, Serbia has also cooperated militarily with Russia. This country took part in joint maneuvers with Russia and its Eurasian allies. There was also information about cooperation between the services of Belgrade and Moscow.
However, Vučić has denied these allegations for months. He says that Serbia supports Ukraine’s independence and territorial integrity (with Crimea and Donbas), does not support the invasion, and has not met with Vladimir Putin for a long time. He explained that Serbia did not join the sanctions against Russia because Moscow supports Belgrade’s position on Kosovo.
On the one hand, Serbian Foreign Minister Ivica Dačić opposes sanctions against Russia. Then again, in January, he stated that Belgrade might change its position if Serbia’s interest requires that.
It is worth mentioning, despite the anti-Western and nationalist rhetoric, the current Serbian government and president consistently declare that their goal is Serbia’s accession to the European Union. Belgrade is also dependent on economic cooperation with the EU. Business partnerships with Russia are mainly limited to the energy sector.
Vuk Drašković, former Serbian Foreign Minister (under Milošević) from the conservative Serbian Renewal Movement Party, which is on the margins of the broadly understood power camp in Serbia (it has several parliamentarians selected from its lists), wrote a few days ago :
“The fascination with Russia as a gulag, as a prison, Russia as an occupier and thief, and Russia as a renegade of Europe causes the tragedy of Serbia and the Serbian people.
In an article published on the Euractiv portal, he stated that Serbia had been a prisoner of Russia for three decades. He also criticized the West for allowing it to happen.
“The anti-NATO, anti-American, and anti-Western mindset of most citizens is perhaps even more remarkable than in North Korea or Iran. The politician wrote that support for crimes against Ukraine is lower in Russia than in Serbia.
We should remember that Vuk Drašković is a contradictory politician. However, he started his political career in communist Yugoslavia as an employee of the regime agency Tanjug. He remains faithful to his anti-communist and monarchist slogans. You can also see nationalism and criticism of the West in his remarks. He was in the opposition during the Milošević regime and the wars in Croatia and Bosnia, but in the late 1990s, he accepted the Foreign Minister position. He was a minister when the Kosovo war broke out. NATO reacted to it by bombing Serbia and Montenegro. Then, their union was still formally called Yugoslavia. After overthrowing Milošević and sending him to The Hague, he was in a coalition with pro-Western governments. He joined the political sector a decade ago with the Serbian Progressive Party.
MaH/belsat.eu politico.com, euractiv.com, 24sata.hr, tass.ru, twitter.com, balkanisight.com
Translated by PEV.
