SERBIA: NIS Sanctions & more – 14th Oct 2025

Dobar dan from Keswick Village! This is the Rorshok Serbia Update from the 14th of October twenty twenty-five. A quick summary of what's going down in Serbia.

The US sanctions on the state-owned Serbian Petrol Industry, or NIS, started to take effect on Thursday the 9th - ten months after their initial announcement. NIS published a statement on Thursday saying that they have enough oil to provide to their customers at the 300 petrol stations they supply, but added that foreign payment cards might not be accepted anymore.

Recall that the US announced sanctions as a way to lower the Russian ownership of NIS, and it had kept granting waivers to NIS so that it could acquire the majority of the stakes in order to avoid sanctions altogether.

As the sanctions took effect, Russia’s gas giant Gazprom offered Serbia an extension of their gas supply deal lasting until the end of the year. President Vucic said that the government expected a brand new gas deal, but added that the extension of the old one is Russia’s test to see whether Serbia will cut them off from NIS.

Since we mentioned Vucic, he lashed out at the Turkish government on Wednesday the 8th for their recent shipment of drones to Kosovo. Vucic called Turkey out in a statement and said that they were trying to destabilize the already brittle peace between Serbia and Kosovo by supplying Kosovo with military equipment. Vucic also said that Turkey was violating UN conventions related to peacekeeping in Kosovo. The Turkish government has not addressed the situation.

On the contrary, Kosovo’s Prime Minister Albin Kurti welcomed Turkey’s drone delivery and said that the purchase will aid Kosovo in building a modern force.

On that note about Kosovo, it held municipal elections on Sunday the 12th across thirty-eight municipalities but the results are not in yet. The main political battle is in the capital, Pristina, where the current ruling party Vetevendosje aims to secure a majority. Vetevendosje is also aiming to expand its influence into smaller municipalities, since it did not secure a majority of seats in this year's parliamentary elections.

In the northern, mainly Serbian municipalities, Belgrade-backed Serbian List party snatched victory, with President Vucic thanking the Serbian voters in Kosovo for their support. As for the mainly Albanian municipalities, many will hold runoffs since none of the candidates received a majority.

This year’s local elections turnout dropped to around forty percent, compared to the forty-five percent in twenty twenty-one.

Speaking of the push for political influence, Serbian farmers are protesting again, since their demands remain unmet. On Monday the 13th and Tuesday the 14th, farmers took to the streets of Belgrade to call on the government to address their dissatisfaction, mainly with the lack of subsidies, financial aid, and monopoly elimination. The farmers’ associations are also requesting tax-free fuel at petrol stations, to pause the repayment of agricultural loans, and more loans with low interest rates.

Recall that the government had previously disregarded the farmers’ demands and called them impossible to fulfill, ignoring their protests. Farmers have been protesting for almost a year now with the same demands.

On Sunday the 12th, the EU announced that they have started with the gradual implementation of its new Entry and Exit System, or EES. The system is intended for non-EU citizens and non-Schengen members who are traveling to and from EU countries. The EES will take the passenger’s fingerprints, photo, and their data into the system in order to track the length of their stay in the EU zone.

The EU said that the EES rollout aims to cut illegal migration into the EU, which often happens through bordering, non-EU countries like Serbia.

In more EU news, several EU organizations in the journalistic field have called on Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, to address media darkness in Serbia. They highlighted the growing crackdown on independent media under President Vucic’s regime. They mentioned the closure of the independent TV channel Al Jazeera Balkans, the pressure on the only independent Serbian outlets N1 and Nova S, and the launch of the government-controlled RT Balkan outlet.

The NGOs also focused on the increasing violence against reporters, adding that there were more than two hundred physical attacks on journalists since twenty twenty-four.

The Rorshok Serbia Update YouTube Channel has also been taken down time and again. The regime is trying to take us down because they think we are dangerous, and there’s an army of trolls trying to exhaust us. This is political silence. Still, we won’t give in, and we will continue to fight back.

Meanwhile, the Let It Be Known NGO said last week that they have received several reports of attacks on the LGBT+ community in Belgrade. In a statement, the NGO said that the attacks were physical and verbal, with the assailants using homophobic and transphobic language and slurs. They added that the group left Nazi symbols and discriminatory messages on LGBT+ bars in the capital, while leaving some with broken windows and doors.

The NGO said that they will take legal action, and called on the police and the prosecutor's office to react to such violence and bigotry.

In some infrastructure news, the railway link between Belgrade and the northernmost city of Subotica started operating on Wednesday the 8th. The new link comes during the closure of the railway station in the northern city of Novi Sad, which has been out of service since the canopy collapse in November of last year.

The new railway link passes through Novi Sad, but does not stop there. Travel time between the two cities is around an hour and forty minutes, which is significantly less than with other means of transport, such as a car or a bus.

Aside from the train links, the government announced that the construction of an airport at the Zlatibor mountain in the west of Serbia will begin in the spring of twenty twenty-six. The mayor of the western town of Cajetina, where Zlatibor is located, said that Zlatibor’s popularity as one of Serbia’s top tourist destinations calls for an easier access point. The mayor added that the construction will be done in multiple phases so that the airport can start operating before it is entirely constructed. The expected finish date for the airport is twenty thirty-one.

Currently, tourists who want to visit Zlatibor have to fly to Belgrade and then travel to Zlatibor by bus or car, which the government deems as less than ideal.

On health updates, the fourth annual Oncology Forum was held on Thursday the 9th. According to the Public Health Institute, Serbia ranks first in Europe when it comes to cancer-related deaths. The doctors in attendance noted that the most frequent types of cancer are lung, prostate, breast and cervical cancer, adding that they account for more than half of all new cases.

The takeaways from the forum included the need for more screenings in order to boost early detection of cancer in patients, which would lower the cancer mortality rates.

On a brighter note, the tap water in the central city of Zrenjanin was declared safe for drinking again after twenty years. The mayor of Zrenjanin said on Thursday the 9th that in the past two decades, tap water in Zrenjanin had high levels of arsenic, which made it undrinkable. However, the mayor said that the sanitary inspection carried out tests and determined that the water is no longer contaminated.

Citizens of Zrenjanin, however, are not so eager to start drinking tap water. Residents said that they do not trust the city government, as they did not publish the results of the water testing that showed it was safe.

Finally, some cultural news. From the 23rd to the 26th of October, the Yugoslav Film Archive in Belgrade will be hosting the Catalan Film Days festival in collaboration with the Catalonia Film Archive. The festival will feature seven film screenings across different genres and historical periods, as well as talks and workshops.

For more information about the Catalan Film Days festival, check out the link in the show notes!

Aaand that’s it for this week! Thank you for joining us!

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Do daljnjeg, zbogom!