Matić: For the authorities in Belgrade, the Russian secret service is the supreme authority

In an interview with "Novosti", a weekly of the Serbian community in Croatia, human rights activist and founder of Radio B92, Veran Matić, spoke about the current situation in Serbia and especially the disastrous role of President Aleksandar Vučić.

Veran Matić, who is attacked by the regime's media as a traitor, said that Aleksandar Vučić is constantly manipulating the situation and wants to postpone the elections as far as possible.

"If the regime's research were accurate and favorable to it, it would have come out on time for the elections. If it is not forced, it will not announce them before the (world exhibition) Expo is over, because relevant actors mention this project as one of the biggest corrupt activities of this government," said Matić.

According to him, the particular problem for Vučić is the presidential elections, because his SNS party does not have an adequate candidate who can succeed him.

"In the history of Serbia, changes of power have always occurred by the regime first losing the presidential level, which then also attracted the parliamentary level. This is how Slobodan Milosevic fell, and this is how Tomislav Nikolic defeated Boris Tadic. Vučić's tactics are clear: bidding with dates, tiring the electorate, weakening the student revolt and absolute readiness for much greater violence than the current one, which is already aggressive," he further stated.

Matić expressed skepticism about the role of the Serbian opposition. He said that the opposition functions in the same way as the government, everything is reduced to individuals, in which case the substance is lost. The problem is of an ideological nature, there is no classic division into left and right; those categories in Serbia today almost do not exist.

"The Democratic Party, which once represented a moderate Serbia with respected professors and a respected infrastructure, today almost does not exist on the ground," Matić added.

The opposition reduces politics to Belgrade and to acting within the parliamentary frameworks that the regime has mercifully allowed, Matić added.

"We know the rule: to win the elections, one must appropriate rural Serbia and show the most uneducated stratum that they will live better than under Vučić. The defeat in the elections of the strongman Viktor Orban shocked Vučić, because the triumph of Peter Magyar best demonstrated everything that the opposition in Serbia is not doing," emphasized the human rights activist and founder of Radio B92.

According to Matić, Magyar achieved success because for two years in a row he visited every settlement in the state without interruption, spending more time in the field than in Budapest.

"If you want to be second or third forever, then the politics of Belgrade's salons is perfectly fine. Vučić plays that card skillfully, keeping his base among the poorest and middle classes who depend directly on the state, such as the 900,000 pensioners over whom he has developed a brutal network of blackmail," Matić announced.

Matić indicated that the European Union's policy has changed and no longer prioritizes human rights and the rule of law.

"Human rights and the rule of law have ceased to be primary, because those questions are no longer important even for leaders in Brussels. The European Commission in official reports states that Serbia is an undemocratic, violent country, with police brutality and no reaction from the prosecution, while at the same time they publicly treat that same country as a stable and desirable partner," said Matić.

He underlined that Vučić's appearance at the Paris military parade - where he appeared as the only leader of a country outside NATO and the EU - serves exclusively to feed his ego and for internal propaganda, which the regime's media presents as a historic success.

Matić is convinced that "behind this foreign policy facade lies naked corruption. The West's communication with Serbia is based mainly on vested interests: Macron sells Rafale fighter jets to Serbia, while Vučić boasts of triumph, also activating his warmongering narratives."

The formula for this cooperation, according to Matić, is simple: "I will buy whatever you can sell me, give me credit, I will be your debtor and servant, just leave me in power."

Matić also criticized Serbia's approach to the past: "The world does not want war criminals to simply surrender mechanically to The Hague; it wants us as a society to confront the bad past. When Slobodan Milošević surrendered, the then government said: 'He is no longer our problem, but the Netherlands'. We believe much more in circumstantial myths than in bare facts."

Matić said that in Serbia, the belief that we are an infallible, "divine" people is deeply rooted, with constant conspiracy theories that the whole world is against us, and we are never guilty.

"For a large part of public opinion, Milosevic died as a martyr, while the convicted criminals became honorable citizens again, heroes who fought against an unjust world, which is not surprising because the same people are rightfully ruling as in the nineties," he declared.

In Serbia, Matić said, pro-European media laws were passed in 2014, "when we were in a good place, 54th on the Reporters Without Borders list; as soon as the official policy changed, Serbia fell to a disastrous 104th place. Serbia follows a policy of constant confrontation, not of building bridges. It is impossible to move forward if you persistently make enemies of your neighbors and if you quarrel with Croatia, which is already a member of the European Union."

Analyzing relations with Russia, Matić said that "the regime relies heavily on pro-Russian sentiment and the myth of Russians as 'historical brothers', and in essence it is a matter of deep propaganda and economic penetration. Russia, through its energy monopoly, is involved in every pore of society. For the power in Belgrade, the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) is the supreme authority."

According to Matić, at the same time, Vučić has handed over all of eastern Serbia to China.

"That region is now practically under Chinese administration to the extent that local authorities cannot even perform basic state functions there, while the entire territory is under a terrible ecological shock that directly endangers people's lives," he announced.

According to Matić, Vučić has sold Serbia to buy his own survival, corrupting China, Russia, and France in turn. Because Serbia's European integration process has turned into a farce and a training ground for mutual trade.

According to Matić, similar to Russia, China, and France - Vučić also attempted to behave with the American government.

"With the Trump administration, he tried to make a deal in the most primitive way - by donating the space of the dilapidated General Staff in Belgrade for the construction of a luxury hotel. This is supreme cynicism and a historical irony that shows that for this regime nothing is sacred," he said.

Matic accused Belgrade of taking the wrong approach towards Serbs in the region.

“There is no self-criticism. Official Belgrade has dramatically distanced itself from the official institutions of the Serbs in Croatia, who are not offered sincere support, but are demanded absolute loyalty, and nothing is given in return. Anyone who refuses to obey is attacked, which in times of regional upheaval is clearly seen through what the regime imposes as a desirable model of behavior. Desirable is Milorad Dodik, who functions as a destructive element and who was rightly under US sanctions. Desirable models are also Milan Knežević in Montenegro, as well as the Serbian List in Kosovo. All this is loyalty to Aleksandar Vučić, with his personal interests and his positions, which has nothing to do with the true interests of the Serbian people in the region. All these people and their destinies are consciously sacrificed for the sake of the politics of a man whose only ambition is to manage crises and manipulate them at the international level, where he is presented as the only one who can calm that chaos," concluded the human rights activist and founder of Radio B92.