Russia

Serbian President Calls Western Demands to Support Sanctions Against Russia Unfair

BELGRADE (Sputnik) - Western demands for Serbia to support sanctions against Russia are unfair, since the country is a sovereign state, is not a member of the European Union, and has itself survived foreign aggression by NATO forces in 1999, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on Sunday.
Sputnik

"You [the West] have not imposed sanctions on gas and oil against Russia. Don't you like it, don't you want to impose sanctions on it? This is logical and reasonable, yes, but you want to decide for a sovereign state, which was not accepted into the EU and with which even Article 31 of the negotiation platform wasn't opened, what sanctions it will support", Vucic told Serbian broadcaster TV Prva.

The president added that Belgrade behaves in accordance with its national interests even if it runs counter to plans of other countries.

"Of course, we are getting in someone's way, someone will always regard us as 'little Russians', they lie, because we are just Serbs. They call us 'Trojan horses', but those who see a mote in someone else's eye, don't see a beam in their own", Vucic said, as quoted by the broadcaster.

At the same time, the president noted that Serbia had experienced being attacked by foreign powers, bearing in mind the 1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia.

"Serbia has an experience that many have not had since 1999. And I am asking liars from The Guardian and the European Greens to tell me whether it was an aggression or not, when Serbia was attacked? When you attack a sovereign country, Serbia has no lies and deception. We equally regard the attack on Serbia and... [events] in Ukraine in the formal legal sense, because Serbia adheres to the principles of international law", the president said, as quoted by the broadcaster.

On 24 March, a rally under the slogan "We are against NATO" took place in Serbia. Demonstrators recalled the beginning of the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia 23 years ago.
The Kosovo village of Gorozhubi comes under attack by U.S. B-52 bombers Sunday June 6 1999.
Earlier in March, the Serbian government supported 4 of the 13 points of a UN resolution condemning Russia's special military operation in Ukraine. All of those points did not imply the introduction of sanctions against Moscow.
In 1999, an armed confrontation between Albanian separatists from the Kosovo Liberation Army and the Serbian Army led to the bombing of what was then the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, consisting of Serbia and Montenegro, by NATO forces. The operation was undertaken without the approval of the UN Security Council and was based on allegations by Western countries that the Yugoslav authorities were allegedly carrying out ethnic cleansing of Kosovo Albanians. NATO airstrikes continued from 24 March to 10 June 1999 and claimed the lives of over 2,500 people, including 87 children.
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