Belgrade’s top diplomat walked a tightrope at Washington’s NATO summit, telling NR that his country is in a ‘delicate’ position.
Belgrade’s top diplomat walked a tightrope at Washington's NATO summit, telling NR that his country is in a ‘delicate’ position.
S erbia is a “modern” country eager to embrace the West, the Balkan state’s top diplomat told National Review in an interview, as Belgrade endeavors to shake the perception in Western countries that it is a Russian client state.
In a wide-ranging conversation last week at his country’s embassy in Washington, on the sidelines of the NATO summit, Serbian foreign minister Marko Ðurić articulated the case for more Serbian engagement with the West — explaining that his country can contribute to regional and global stability. He touted Serbia’s support of Ukraine, including his own recent meeting with his counterpart from Kyiv, Dmytro Kuleba. And he defended his country’s right to continue to seek close ties with Moscow and Beijing as it also pursues an EU-membership path and a strategic dialogue with Washington.
“I think it’s a very powerful message,” Ðurić said of his presence at the NATO summit, “because we are a country striving to rebuild its connections with the West, and I’m here because I believe that it’s in the national interest of Serbia.”
He said that he traveled to Washington to communicate the message that Serbia wants to “play a constructive role in regional and global politics with our small capacity” and to “refresh people’s image about Serbia, because most people last heard about Serbia during the 1990s, and not in a very favorable way.”
Serbia’s relationship with NATO is complicated. The alliance’s U.S.-led bombing campaign in Yugoslavia in 1999 still inspires strong antipathy toward the West among Serbians, many of whom also hold favorable views of Russia. Kosovo — the territory that Belgrade regards as a “breakaway province” but whose independence Washington supports — also remains top of mind. Ðurić invoked his country’s position on Kosovo and “the legacy issues stemming from the 1990s” several times during the interview.
But Ðurić’s meetings in Washington also illustrate that Belgrade’s overtures aren’t unreciprocated and that the U.S. is interested in pulling Serbia out of Moscow’s orbit.
The Serbian official said he chatted briefly with Secretary of State Antony Blinken on the sidelines of a NATO event, urging the top Biden envoy to visit Serbia. His discussions at the White House and State Department, meanwhile, were primarily focused on U.S. investment in energy projects, Ðurić said, touting a pending $1.7 billion investment in solar power. He told NR that this would help his country diversify its energy supply from Russia, on which it is largely reliant.
Serbia’s political support of Ukraine buoys this outreach. Under the presidency of Aleksandar Vučić, Belgrade has supported U.N. resolutions condemning the Russian invasion. Although it has declined to join EU sanctions packages targeting Moscow, reports have found that the Serbian government has not hindered firms in the country from selling ammunition to NATO members, including Spain and the Czech Republic, who have then transferred it to Ukraine.
“I want to underline that we deeply regret this horrible conflict. We want it to end as soon as possible. We have received hundreds of thousands of refugees from Ukraine and offered various types of humanitarian assistance to the country, and we will continue advocating for the cessation of hostilities,” Ðurić said.
The complexity of Serbia’s policy toward the war stems from the fact that both Russia and Ukraine support Belgrade’s position on Kosovo, he said. “We’re kind of in a delicate position. But regardless of that, we took a moral and legal stance which is based on the U.N. charter, despite the difficulties, despite the pressure that we are facing, and despite the geopolitical position we are in.”
“Just take a look at the map, and you’ll see that for Serbia, with its problems and legacy issues stemming from the 1990s, it’s not easy to take the course that we’ve taken.” His meeting with Kuleba was the first that he took as foreign minister, he emphasized.
The appointment of Ðurić as foreign minister (until three months ago, he had served as the country’s ambassador in Washington) puts a fine point on the complex nature of Serbia’s foreign policy. He noted the origins of his political career as a pro-democracy campaigner against the regime of Slobodan Milošević, and, in conversation with NR, he talked up the history of the Serbian embassy building — Theodore Roosevelt’s former residence in Washington.
The government reshuffle in which Ðurić took the top foreign-ministry role also saw the appointment of Aleksandar Vulin as deputy foreign minister. Vulin, a former intelligence chief sanctioned by the U.S. in 2023 for his alleged involvement in arms-trafficking, is widely regarded to be close to Moscow and to hold the view that Serbia should absorb the other Balkan states.
Asked how Americans should view Vulin’s inclusion in the government, Ðurić replied that the government consists of “a vast array of a very broad coalition of political actors,” all of whom channel President Vučić’s vision. “The idea is focused on having Serbia as a modern country and as a full-fledged member of the European community,” he said, adding that Belgrade is committed to implementing reforms to enter the EU by 2027, a goal that all the political parties represented in Serbia’s current government, including Vulin’s, support.