Vucic's Moscow visit: Balancing Serbia's future between East and West
I came to Moscow to fight for the Serbian nation. However, we remain committed to the European path, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic emphasized on Wednesday after landing in the Russian capital.
Vucic will participate in the Victory Day celebrations in Moscow and will engage in discussions with Vladimir Putin about gas supplies.
"I'm here to fight for my nation and my country. I don't care what anyone else in the world says. I was elected by the Serbian people. I was not elected by anyone in Riga, Tallinn, Vilnius, Kaunas, or anywhere else," Vucic stated in an interview with broadcaster RTS. Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia had previously denied him passage through their territory.
Vucic accused "Western leaders" of a "lack of understanding."
"They have done us great harm by taking away 5% of our territory (the unrecognized Kosovo, a former province of Serbia - ed.), and today they tell us not to return to the past and to look to the future. They offer us nothing but threats and intimidation," the Serbian president asserted.
He emphasized that in Moscow, he will primarily focus on discussing gas supplies.
President Vucic announced his trip to Moscow at the end of April. The Serbian leader is set to meet with Russia’s President, Vladimir Putin—this will be their first official meeting since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
At that time, Serbia accepted thousands of Ukrainian refugees, condemned Russian aggression multiple times, and sent humanitarian aid to Kyiv. Simultaneously, the government in Belgrade maintains high-level contacts with Russia and refuses to join the EU sanctions imposed on that country, to which it is officially a candidate.
