If only a part of Russian immigrants stay in the Serbian capital, it will bring big changes, writes the Swiss “Neue Zürcher Zeitung”. The report states that most of the Russians did not come for political reasons, but for work.
“Since the beginning of the war, Belgrade has been home to a large and colourful Russian diaspora. Many are likely to stay and change the city”, writes Neue Zürcher Zeitung, reports Deutsche Welle (DW).
A report by the respected newspaper says that some 200,000 Russians have arrived in Serbia in what it describes as “an immigration wave of historic proportions”.
“Their presence is transforming the capital and forcing some Serbs to revise their distorted image of Russia and Putin”, the text reads.
The first wave after the outbreak of the war brought dissidents and activists to the country. “In the second wave in September, alongside those opposed to the war, came many professionals and businessmen who had left Russia because of the economic consequences of the war.”
“Serbia became a destination because it did not impose sanctions against Moscow. There is no travel ban. Anyone who registers a company immediately gets a residence permit, others have to renew their tourist visa again and again,” the Zurich newspaper writes.
Who started the war?
The journalist spoke to Denis (26), a Russian who escaped mobilisation for a war he does not approve of. He now works for an NGO in Belgrade, helping to evacuate refugees from Ukraine. He says he likes Belgrade.
“Whoever he talks to, he almost always has sympathy for them. But unfortunately often for the wrong reasons,” the newspaper quotes him as saying. Denis illustrates this by talking to two young Serbs on a train.
“They were still somehow able to understand that I ran away from the war,” says Denis, but they never accepted that Russia started that war. “They said that the West provoked Putin. I couldn’t convince them.”
The article reports that more than 60 per cent of Serbs blame NATO and the West for the war. “This narrative goes: after NATO defeated Serbia by bombing it during the Kosovo war in 1999, the West is trying to bring Russia to its knees. This analogy can be heard in every taxi and every pub and read in the newspaper every day. The implicit message is that Russia will now avenge Serbia’s humiliation,” the newspaper writes.
As after the October Revolution
Reporter Andreas Ernst, formerly a long-time correspondent in Belgrade, describes how Russian can be heard everywhere, in the parks of the old town, on the streets of Dorćol or on Vračar. “Lately there are Russian shops, restaurants and bars, and since Russian expats are mostly young and urban, they are also changing the cultural scene.”
To a journalist, it looks like the time after the October Revolution in 1917, when thousands of opponents of the revolution came to Belgrade. They brought to Belgrade, he writes, the nightlife for which the city is now widely known.
“If at least some of the Russian migrants take root there, the city will also change economically.” Last year, 4,500 Russian companies were registered in Serbia, a large part of them in the IT sector,” writes Neue Zürcher Zeitung.
It’s shamelessly expensive
This is reflected in prices. A journalist describes a café opened by Russian immigrants in Dorćol. There, lemonade imported from Berlin costs around five euros, which is “shamelessly expensive” for Belgrade, the journalist writes. But many guests from Russia pay for it without any problems.
Peter Nikitin (42), a lawyer and activist, hopes that the presence of so many Russian migrants will break down Serbs ingrained positive prejudices about today’s Russia. Nikitin runs the Russian Democratic Society, organises debates and protests in Belgrade.
As he estimated in an interview with a Swiss newspaper, only a fifth of Russians in Belgrade could be described as political opponents of war, another fifth are threatened by war, and 60% are neutral. “They are waiting to see how things develop at home”, Nikitin says./N1/