Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić. Photo: EPA-EFE/MARKO DJOKOVIC

The Kremlin has accepted an apology from Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić after his country’s delegation voted in favour of a resolution condemning Russia’s war against Ukraine at the United Nations, state-affiliated news agency Interfax reported on Tuesday.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Tuesday that he had heard and accepted Vučić’s apology, commenting that “technical mistakes happen, and we are impressed by the prompt reaction”, according to Interfax.

Peskov’s comments followed Vučić’s statement on Monday night in which he said that Serbia had “made a mistake” when voting in favour of European-backed UN General Assembly resolution reaffirming Ukraine’s territorial integrity that passed with 93 countries voting in favour, 18, including Russia and the US, voting against, and 65 abstentions.

Vučić said Serbia should have abstained from voting on the resolution instead, as it did on a competing General Assembly resolution proposed by the US, telling Serbian channel Happy Television: “I take the blame for it myself because I’m probably tired and burdened and can’t get everything done.”

Later on Monday, Russia and the US were among the 10 UN Security Council member states who voted in favour of a US-backed UN Security Council resolution “mourning the loss of life” and calling for a swift end to the war in Ukraine, while five member states, including France and the UK, abstained. Notably, the US-backed resolution failed to label the Kremlin as an aggressor and referred to the Russian invasion of Ukraine as the “Russia-Ukraine conflict”.