SERBIA: Election Fraud & more – 16th Jan 2024

Dobar dan from Keswick Village! This is the Rorshok Serbia Update from the 16th of January twenty twenty-four. A quick summary of what's going down in Serbia.

The Party of European Socialists, or PES, sent a letter to Serbian PM Brnabic asking her to address the fraud allegations revolving around the 17th of December parliamentary elections. In the letter, they called on the ruling Serbian Progressive Party, or SNS, to launch a transparent investigation into all reported irregularities. These allegations, reported by independent election observers, include vote buying, voter pressuring, and the illegal voting of Serbs from Bosnia that SNS bussed to Belgrade.

The PES condemned the ruling party for detaining student protestors and misusing public records.

Despite the allegations, EU institutions did not seem eager to take action, which is why the PES contacted the SNS.

On Friday the 12th, the opposition New Democratic Party of Serbia and the NADA opposition coalition announced that they had drafted an action plan to present to the representatives of the opposition coalition Serbia Against Violence.

The action plan addresses two possible scenarios and their outcomes. They include the opposition’s plan of action in case the Belgrade local elections are repeated and what would happen if the elections are not rerun. Milos Jovanovic, one of NADA’s leaders, said that the opposition as a whole needs to define the conditions under which they will participate in the possible repeat of the elections. These conditions include the cleanup of the voter roll before the possible new elections and equal media representation of both the ruling party and the opposition.

In other news…

On Thursday the 11th, president Vucic met with Chistopher Hill, the US ambassador to Serbia, and discussed Kosovo’s request to purchase anti-tank missiles from the US. Hill told Vucic that the US State Department intends to send Kosovo’s request to the US Congress. Upon hearing the news, Vucic expressed his disappointment in Kosovo in the name of Serbia but noted that Serbia will continue to act responsibly and contribute to preserving the peace in the Balkans.

Kosovo's Ministry of Defense said that the procurement of the missiles will serve to expand the military capacity of the Kosovo Security Forces. However, to Vucic, this decision looked like a threat to the already brittle peace between Kosovo and Serbia. Still, Vucic told Hill that he would continue to work on preserving Serbian-American relations.

On the same day, Kosovo’s PM Kurti addressed the ongoing normalization talks between Kosovo and Serbia, and said that the formation of the Community of Serbian Municipalities, or CSM, should not be the main priority for the normalization process. Kurti said that Serbia should focus on accepting the Basic Agreement and the Implementation Annex, two of the main agreements that the EU crafted with consultations of Kosovo and Serbia. Back in October, when the EU officials presented the two main agreements, Vucic refused to sign them since the agreements obliged Serbia to a de-facto recognition of Kosovo.

However, EU representatives are disagreeing with Kurti. Viola von Cramon, a Member of the European Parliament, said that without CSM, the normalization dialogue would be a difficult process. The formation of the CSM was agreed on back in twenty thirteen. However, Kosovo never implemented it.

On that note about bilateral relations, Volodymyr Tolkach, the Ukrainian Ambassador to Belgrade, called on Serbia to immediately condemn Russia’s ongoing violence in Ukraine, adding that Ukraine has suffered attacks from more than 500 missiles and drones during the holiday period. Tolkach noted that Serbia’s ties to Russia, being their similarities in religious beliefs, should not be enough for Serbia to defend Russia’s aggression, as those similarities, when it came to Ukraine, clearly did not matter to Russia.

Despite Russia’s ongoing aggression in Ukraine, Serbia remains one of the few countries that haven’t cut ties with Russia since the start of the war.

Moreover, Serbia is even trying to improve its relations with Russia. On Wednesday the 10th, Vucic visited the Russian Center of Science and Culture in Serbia’s capital and left Russia a message saying that Serbia wants to build even better relations with the country in the future. Vucic confirmed the “traditional and firm friendship” between the Serbians and the Russians, adding that he was happy he had the opportunity to learn more about Russia’s culture. He went on to call Russia Serbia’s friend and added that it is Serbia’s duty to respect them. Despite Russia’s aggression in Ukraine, Vucic stated that he admires both Russian culture and its policies.

Both the US and the EU have criticized Serbia for not condemning Russia’s aggression, going as far as to change the conditions for Serbia’s accession path to the EU. Still, Serbian representatives continue to vocalize their support for Russia.

However, not all Serbians share the same feelings towards Russia.

Numerous videos of Serbian mercenaries fighting on Russia’s side against Ukraine have been spreading on social media, showcasing Serbians talking about the torture they experienced at the hands of Russian officers. All of the mercenaries drafted for the Russian-Ukraine war are soldiers who have signed contracts with Russia’s Ministry of Defence, making them volunteers. Soon after the draft, the soldiers started vocalizing their discomfort, with one volunteer reporting that the Russian officers treated him and his colleagues with no respect, even withholding clothes and shoes from the soldiers.

In some news on the economy, The National Bank of Serbia, or NBS, reported that in twenty twenty-three, the remittances to Serbia amounted to nearly five billion dollars, which is two percent more than the record year of twenty twenty-two. NBS stated that the number of remittances went up after the coronavirus pandemic, adding that other factors to the increase in remittances include inflation growth and the increasing number of foreigners living in Serbia. However, the central bank said that foreign remittances tend to grow during times of increased global uncertainty and geopolitical tensions, and added that they expect the flow of remittances to Serbia to stabilize.

On that note about foreigners in Serbia…

The Confederation of Autonomous Trade Unions of Serbia published that in twenty twenty-three, Serbia issued more than 50,000 work permits to foreigners. Most of the permits, around 20,000, went to Russians, around 10,000 went to Chinese residents, and roughly 5,000 to Turkish citizens. The Confederation of Autonomous Trade Unions believes that most of them work at construction sites, fruit and vegetable plantations, as vendors in food kiosks and as bus drivers. With the increase of foreigners in Serbia, the government recently passed an amendment to the Law on the Employment of Foreigners; Serbia made the access to its market more efficiently accessible by expediting and improving the process of work permit issuing.

In other news, the journalists and editors of the Weekly Informational Newspaper, or NIN, one of the oldest media companies in Serbia, have issued a collective press release saying that they resigned to maintain their professional integrity. NIN has a new owner who said they wanted to conceptually change NIN, while adding that the weekly newspaper will continue to nurture independence, trust, and information. However, the editorial staff said that it was not clear whether they would be able to continue doing their work in the same manner, which they labeled as “guided exclusively by the imperatives of professional journalism.”

In their statement, NIN’s entire editorial staff also said that they will continue their work in a new weekly magazine.

Aaaaaand that's it for this week!

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Do daljnjeg, zbogom!