Prelević: Vučić fears parallels with Maduro – undemocratic regime, crime and corruption

Lawyer Božo Prelević has said that the authorities in Serbia are afraid of the many similarities between the rule of President Aleksandar Vučić and that of Venezuela’s arrested president, Nicolás Maduro.

Speaking to the Beta news agency, Prelević said that the U.S. intervention in Venezuela was contrary to international conventions and the United Nations Charter, warning that it “opens an incalculable space for other countries to do the same.”

“What the U.S. administration did in Venezuela could encourage other major powers to attack states that possess economic resources and where the rule of law is not respected,” Prelević said.

According to him, all countries with a favorable geostrategic position or reserves of rare minerals, and where organized crime exists, may fear military intervention by major powers.

“Vučić is frightened by the terrifying coincidence with Maduro. Serbia is governed by an undemocratic regime that has not allowed free and fair elections since 2012, as also stated by ODIHR. Maduro did not accept defeat in the most recent elections in Venezuela and expelled from the country the opposition leader who won the majority of votes. Vučić’s regime uses illegal paramilitary formations to protect itself, similar to Maduro’s ‘collectives.’ The government in Serbia is deeply immersed in crime and corruption, just like Maduro’s regime in Venezuela. And finally, Serbia has significant deposits of lithium and boron,” Prelević said.

He added that the same company operated in both Venezuela and Serbia to manipulate the U.S. presidential elections when Donald Trump lost to Joe Biden.

“The Serbian government is showing a fairly high level of fear because of the very similar parallels with the Venezuelan government. Vučić also knows what kind of fiasco he experienced in May last year at the Republican Convention in Miami, when he tried to discredit the gathering and drag both the Republican Party and President Trump into the sphere of corruption by falsifying their names. He attempted to do the same with the General Staff building in Belgrade. Due to President Vučić’s behavior, the U.S. has imposed the highest customs tariffs on Serbia in Europe, and NIS and ‘Linglong’ are under sanctions,” Prelević stressed.

“The catastrophic rule of radicals and socialists”

According to Prelević, the new U.S. strategy toward the Western Balkans has created conditions for imposing sanctions on the “key players” of the Belgrade regime, as was done two years ago against former BIA director Aleksandar Vulin.

“It is interesting that Milorad Dodik from Bosnia understood the new U.S. strategy, but Vučić did not. Vučić did not address Serbia’s position in the new global situation; instead, he invented ridiculous tricks like ‘Ćacilend,’” he said.

Commenting on the convening of Serbia’s National Security Council over developments in Venezuela, Prelević said he did not know what decision the Serbian authorities might make.

“They (the authorities in Belgrade) will try again to corrupt some world politicians, because they have no other system. So far, they have done nothing else in international politics but attempt to bribe someone,” the lawyer said.

Prelević noted that over the past 35 years, radicals and socialists have been in power in Serbia twice, and that their rule ended catastrophically for both the people and the state.

“I fear that the rule of radicals and socialists will now end with some kind of external action like what happened in Venezuela. That would be extremely tragic for Serbia. Vučić is now trying to see what his way out is. He will not worry about Serbia, but he is very worried about how to save himself and his money. I am sure that half of Vučić’s associates will ask him to flee to where their money is. There is another possibility, which is not very realistic—that Vučić turns the page, frees the media, and organizes fair elections,” Prelević concluded.