Having been in power for almost ten years, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic is known for his skill in the art of obfuscation, enabling him to steer his country around the interests of major powers, all the while vowing to – one day – lead it into the European Union (EU). Yet on the eve of a new early legislative election – which he had called for Sunday, December 17, and which he will almost certainly win – this 53-year-old leader has, for once, clearly spelled out his deep geopolitical thoughts. None of which are very compatible with European values.
On December 12, on Happy TV – one of the many television channels that are close to the government, and on which Vucic, a baby-faced, two-meter-tall giant of a man, makes almost daily appearances to campaign for his movement, the Serbian Progressive Party – he openly expressed his admiration for the former dictator Slobodan Milosevic. Vucic had served as information minister to the dictator, before his downfall in 2000. Milosevic, who in 2006 died in custody in The Hague – before the end of his trial for crimes against humanity and genocide – was a man of "excellent presence and exceptional diction," Vucic lauded in front of the cameras, without a word of consideration for the victims of the Serbian army during the Balkan wars.
While he officially broke with nationalism in 2008 to become pro-European, Vucic, who became prime minister and then president in 2014, claimed to "reproach [his former mentor] for only one thing": "Not having better understood the external circumstances" in 1999, when Serbia was bombed by NATO in retaliation for the massacres committed by its army in Kosovo. "He should have said stop after four or five days, because there are times when you have to accept certain defeats," he explained, taking the example of "the Aliyevs in Azerbaijan," who first lost Nagorno-Karabakh following a major military defeat against Armenia in 1994, only to reclaim it in September after a lightning-fast war.
In taking advantage of the Armenians' weakened Russian ally, Ilham Aliyev, Azerbaijan's president – who has been in power since he succeeded his father in 2003 – had waited "27 years for favorable geopolitical opportunities," the Serbian president praised, observing his interviewers' reactions over his glasses. The message was then understood by all Serbian citizens: Their president hoped to bring the same fate to Kosovo, which proclaimed independence in 2008 but which Belgrade still categorically refuses to recognize. Vucic also referred to the "important American elections" in November 2024, barely concealing his hope of seeing former president Donald Trump return to power.
You have 65% of this article left to read. The rest is for subscribers only.