Sonja Biserko for Geopost: Serbia is moving towards the territorialization of the Serbian issue, Banjska has shown that the potential for conflict is huge

The Banjska case actually showed that the potential for conflict is huge, says Sonja Biserko, founder and president of the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Serbia, in an interview with Geopost, adding that Banjska showed that the operation was much wider, but it was thwarted and prevented bloodshed and conflict.

Biserko believes that Kosovo is a point beyond which the West will not tolerate any activities by Serbia or Russia.

“It is not only a question of Serbia and the ‘Serbian world’, but it is a question of the intertwining of at least two interests – Russian and Serbian – that is, American and European”.

In this case, she says, Russia is the only one that is visibly present in some way and that can most easily start any mechanism that would lead to some tensions and conflicts after all.

“And this is something that can actually be extended to Republika Srpska and Montenegro.”

Serbia, she states, has not closed the Serbian issue and there is still a current that tends to revise the war defeats from the 1990s.

“Vucic is very aware that he cannot cross that border anymore, that it will not be tolerated.” Now the question is when and how they will act, probably after the elections, since now at this stage Kosovo is playing an important card or argument for the campaign, or an important pillar of that campaign, as it has always been used so far”.

Biserko assesses that in the Republika Srpska there is a network of criminal and gangster groups that are very powerful economically, they are armed, they even have political power considering that they are strong locally.

“It is a powerful army that can be very useful in situations when the opportunity arises, that is, when someone decides to use them.”

She states that Russia is looking for a way to end the war in Ukraine with some kind of Dayton agreement.

Both Belgrade and Russia, assesses Biserko, are expecting possible changes next year, especially in the White House.

Full Interview

The Geopost: When Vucic says that he fears that 2024 will bring much more conflict and unrest, referring to the Serbian threat in Kosovo, Republika Srpska and other parts of the region, is he actually announcing war?

Biserko: Vucic is speaking on the trail of all these statements and analyzes about the fact that a new front will be possible in the Balkans, that is, that Russia will try to destabilize the region through its local actors. This has been talked about since the beginning of the war in Ukraine and the Banjska case actually showed that this potential was huge, that the operation was much wider, but it was thwarted, stopped and a greater bloodshed and conflict was prevented. Since then, the West has been following what is happening very closely because that is the red line that they will not cross, they will not tolerate Vucic or Serbia because it directly threatens the security of Europe itself.

So, this is the critical point that was always there during Yugoslavia and the nineties, and in 1999. It is that critical, strategically neuralgic point that is very important for this part of the Balkans, and that is why there was an intervention in order to prevent the conflict from spreading to Macedonia at one time, which was probably some idea of Milosevic.

Kosovo is the point beyond which the West will not tolerate any activities by Serbia or Russia. It is not only a question of Serbia and the “Serbian world”, but it is a question of the intertwining of at least two interests – Russian and Serbian – i.e. American and European, of course, other Turkish and Chinese interests are also intertwining… But in this case, Russia is the only one which is visibly present in some way and which can most easily trigger any mechanism that would lead to some tensions and conflicts after all. And this is something that can actually be extended to Republika Srpska and Montenegro.

As for the Western Balkans, they have three points where they can raise tensions and possibly create a conflict situation.

The Geopost: Of those three points, which one is in the greatest danger?

Biserko: Now Montenegro itself is in great danger, considering that for the last three years this team that is now in power, that was installed by the church and Belgrade, is working to empty Montenegrin sovereignty and everything that Montenegro was until now, and it is going quite undisturbed. The last instrument in the rounding up of some Serbs in Montenegro is the census that should follow in a month or later, a postponement was requested, considering the very sensitive political moment. What is worrying is that Serbia is constantly moving towards the territorialization of the Serbian question, which can happen, for example, in Montenegro.

The Geopost: What are you trying to say?

Biserko: This was even talked about by a Russian journalist, Gennady Sisoyev, who lives in Podgorica, who said that something like SAO Krajina (Serbian Autonomous Region of Krajina) was possible, what was in Croatia, and what is now in the Republika Srpska and what has always been an aspiration to be in the north of Kosovo as well.

The Geopost: In this sense, how do you evaluate the visit of the Secretary General of NATO to the region?

Biserko: The last visit of NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg was very significant, regardless of the fact that it was previously planned, but the speech at the press conference of both (Vucic and Stoltenberg) showed that a very serious conversation was held behind the scenes. Because his body language and the fact that Vucic tried to market that only Serbia can determine where the Serbian army will be deployed, and that is the answer, first of all, to the request of the Pentagon, NATO and other Western countries that the army withdraw from the south of Serbia after Banjska because it was deployed in Sandzak and next to the border. To that, Vucic tried to answer that only Serbia has the authority to decide on this. However, it can be seen that it was a very serious conversation.

The problem is that Serbia is now in an election campaign, which for the first time speaks in favor of something that Vucic is not used to seeing or hearing until now, which is that he may not win the election with a large majority, I think he will win it, but in any case, there is some flow in society, whether it will be politically capitalized, I don’t know.

I think that we should mention two important events that determined what is happening in Serbia today – the massacre of young people at the beginning of May in the school “Vladislav Ribnikar” (Belgrade) and in Mladenovac – that exposed the level of violence in this society, which after all initiated those protests in Belgrade and other cities of Serbia and it somehow grew. The feeling I got is that the fear, the coolness of fear, was simply lost, and it was a protest of citizens who were not political, but in any case, they carried the dissatisfaction that now erupts every day in Serbia in various cities.

The second, of course, is the Banjsko event, which showed how much potential Serbia has for destabilization. It was known until now, but here it became evident for the first time that it still subconsciously wants something like that to happen, that is, it shows that Serbia has not closed the Serbian issue and that there is still a current that tends to revise the war defeats from 1990s. It was somehow thwarted and I think that Vucic is very aware that he cannot cross that line anymore, that it will not be tolerated. Now the question is when and how he will act, probably after the elections, since now at this stage Kosovo plays an important card or argument for the campaign, or an important support of that campaign, as it has always been used until now. Kosovo has always been important for Serbian elections.

Then there is another element that I forgot to mention, which is that Seselj is part of his coalition, which means that he (Vucic) takes care of every vote that can be obtained that belongs to that block. Seselj’s electorate is not large, but in any case, it is obviously counting on those votes, and in that sense, the rhetoric and narrative of the campaign is to a large extent radicalized and resembles the 1990s, and I think that in that context, among other things, the incident with Croatia and the expulsion of their diplomat. Although it has to do with some other things related to Banjska, but this part also has to do with the electoral body that sees Croatia as an arch-enemy.

Otherwise, the “Progressives” perceive Croatia as an arch-enemy and it is always easiest to raise that tension, and it can be said that since the “Progressives” have been in power, diplomatic and political relations with that country are virtually at zero. Economic relations are at a rather unenviable level, at the level it used to be, with the fact that Croatia has larger investments here than Serbia. But in general, I think that Serbia’s relations with the region are at a very low level precisely because of its aspirations and that project ‘Serbian world’, which of course is perceived in the region with great mistrust, and Serbia cannot actually develop normal regional relations as long as that level of mistrust is so high, and it is, among other things, high because Serbia does not recognize any responsibility for the 1990s, and that is a starting point considering all the unresolved issues arising from the breakup and interpretation of the breakup of Yugoslavia, from which numerous problems arise, of course. And all of this is somehow here in Belgrade, in Serbia, and not only the government but also the majority of the opposition and society. And that is that Serbia is not responsible for those wars and the like, and parallel to that is the revision of the history of the 1990s and earlier and of course the glorification of convicted war criminals who now interpret everything that happened in Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo, and that in some way forms the opinion of young generations who also learn it in schools in one way or another. In any case, a public opinion is created that is charged with these tensions, frustrations and animosity.

The Geopost: Let’s go back to Kosovo. As Stoltenberg stated, “the accumulation of the Serbian army near the Kosovo border does not help calm the situation.” Serbia still has deployed forces on the border with Kosovo. Why is that?

Biserko: It’s a show of muscle right before the elections, but I think that NATO is carefully watching and following everything that happens on the ground. That’s how they discovered that they were preparing that operation in the north of Kosovo, that was discovered by KFOR and they signaled to the Albanians what would happen there. As far as that is concerned, Serbia is surrounded by NATO countries or countries that want to join NATO. The only countries left behind from the NATO system are Bosnia, which has EUFOR, which is part of NATO, and Kosovo, which has KFOR. That leaves Serbia, which has a high degree of cooperation with NATO, has the IPAP Agreement, which is the last step to membership in NATO. So it is constantly in some contradiction, on the one hand, there is this cooperation especially with Ohio, the American army, British and Norwegian, those are the three NATO countries in charge of Serbia, and on the other hand, there are all these strategic agreements with Russia and exercises which it carried out until the Russian aggression against Ukraine and buys weapons from all sides and China, and Russia and Turkey and in the West. Now they got some military helicopters. Under the pretext that Serbia, as a supposedly neutral country, is building its military system so that it can defend itself while no one threatens it, none of the neighboring countries have either the potential or the intention to show any aspirations towards Serbia.

The Geopost: BiH Defense Minister Zukan Helez said that the training of paramilitary formations led by people from Russia is being organized in the Republika Srpska. How do you look at it?

Biserko: The fact is that in Serbia and in the Republic of Serbia there are numerous groups, mostly criminal groups that are well connected, mostly all of them are pro-Russian and they mainly serve to put pressure on the local level, for the disobedient. But it is a powerful army that can be very useful in situations when the opportunity arises, that is, when someone decides to use them. In any case, it is a network of criminal and gangster groups that are very economically powerful, they are armed, they even have political power considering that they are strong locally, so it is a backup system, so to speak. NATO knows all this and they monitor it all.

The Geopost: You say NATO monitors everything. Montenegro is a member of the Alliance, and the elected president of the Assembly (Andrija Mandić), a well-known pro-Russian person, has access to sensitive intelligence data by function.

Biserko: I think that NATO will limit their access to that sensitive information. They already did that once during the DPS, when someone who was in charge of cooperation with NATO apparently presented some information and was denied access to that sensitive information. I don’t think that NATO will let Montenegro go, considering that it is about the Adriatic and an important strategic location of Montenegro, although they missed the opportunity to react in time and stop the pro-Serbian and pro-Russian forces that are now actually running Montenegro in full measure. Montenegrins, Bosniaks and Croats were excluded from the new government. What this young government of Montenegro is showing now is that it is pro-Belgrade, that it is heavily influenced by Belgrade and that it is inferior.

The Geopost: Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama proposed in Skopje that the future format of the NATO meeting takes place with the presence of other Western Balkan countries that are not members of the Alliance. How do you look at it?

Biserko: This is a region that is not fundamentally ready nor does it have the potential to enter full membership in the EU, since the ratings are now being discussed about expansion for certain aid packages, including loans. I think that the first step for these three non-NATO countries is to become NATO members as soon as possible. In my opinion, that is simply one of the priorities when it comes to the Western Balkans.

The Geopost: It is often said that the future of this region depends a lot on the outcome of the war in Ukraine. However, more and more often the West is presenting options to redefine Ukraine’s past success in the war and get Zelensky to negotiate. What would any kind of peace in Ukraine mean for this region and what kind of message does it send to Russia?

Biserko: Russia for a long time and various of its analysts believe that Russia should be an actor in the final solution of the Balkan issue, they believe that this is not the final solution, they talk about recomposition and talk about a role of Russia itself in those negotiations. I think that the West should not allow that because, as you know, Russia and Serbia constantly want to move the Kosovo issue back to the UN, however, of course, that will not happen because the UN would also include China and Russia, who are preventing Kosovo’s admission to the UN anyway. Considering that both are members of the UN Security Council, but primarily they do so for some of their own interests. Russia, above all, because it uses it as a precedent for everything it does in its immediate neighborhood in those wars and annexed territories such as Crimea and now the east of Ukraine. In fact, Russia is leading the whole story in such a way that eventually Ukraine will end with some kind of Dayton agreement. There is already talk that Russia is tired of war, that it is looking for a way to end that war. Now the big question for the Ukrainians is whether they can allow the war to end so that one part of the territory remains occupied, they ultimately went to war to liberate those parts. That is now a big question and it depends on many circumstances that are developing on a daily basis. But all those new points of instability, such as the Middle East, which can eventually move to another end in the Far East via North Korea, which fires missiles every hour, regardless of the agreement it has with South Korea, it does not respect anything. Everything that is open and where it is possible to do something, I think that Russia is pushing it everywhere because it is obviously looking for a way out of that war in Ukraine, but we will see how things will develop further. First of all, I think that they are all waiting for changes in America, in the White House, then we saw that Europe with its elections next year, that the Netherlands got or will get a very right-wing government, and this can happen in other European countries as well. This is what Russia is waiting for as an opportunity to actually stop supporting Ukraine and sending weapons and everything that was necessary to wage that war. So there are a lot of unknowns and a lot of anticipation. In this sense, Belgrade itself expects and withdraws from any implementation of the Ohrid and Brussels agreements in anticipation of possible changes next year.

/The Geopost