Russian influence and nationalism are growing, EU to support pro-European forces in the Western Balkans

 

Member of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) Željko Komšić warned about the existence of powerful mega-nationalist projects in the region, and that ideas from the nineties are not dead.

 

"Don't think that you can come to an agreement with them, they will wait to realize what they intended in the nineties. This will happen if these ideas are not removed from public life, the educational system, because people do not see how many seeds of evil are being sown these areas," Komšić believes.

 

According to the President of Montenegro, Milo Đukanović, Russian influence has taken up space in the region that had previously left the EU. He recalled the attempted coup d'état in Montenegro in 2016, assessing that that event had the same political signature as today's aggression against Ukraine.

"Russia continued to very sophisticatedly develop its model of hybrid destruction in the Western Balkans. I think it has developed two serious bases of its hybrid war, the first is Serbia, and the second is Republika Srpska," Đukanović said at the forum.

 

Clarifying his thesis, Đukanoviće said that in these countries there is a strong presence of Russian media with a tendency to spread, which is shown by the intention of broadcasting Russia Today from Serbia, then the strong activity of their intelligence and security agencies, as well as a powerful presence in the economic sector, especially in the area of energy.

 

"There is also the brutal abuse of the Serbian Orthodox Church, which some of our Western partners lamented in 2020, only to be qualified two years later by the European Parliament as a means of influencing the malignant Russian policy in the Balkans," Đukanović said.

 

In 2020, under the leadership of the Serbian Orthodox Church, demonstrations were launched against Đukanović's government, due to the then Law on Freedom of Religion.

 

The so-called litija movement consisted of all opposition parties and the SPC, which that year helped the opposition to oust the thirty-year-old Đukanović government.

"When you know that all these instruments are very strongly supported by a huge amount of money from the same source, then it is clear that Russia worked very seriously in the previous period," Djukanović added.

 

He also stated that in those years he often drew the attention of Western and European partners to what was happening in Montenegro and the region, but that he encountered suspicion in response to clear Russian attempts at revisionism.

 

Đukanović believes that the aggression against Ukraine, as well as the coup attempt in Montenegro in 2016 (due to the decision to join NATO), is Russia's attempt to deny independent states the right to choose their own future:

 

"Ukraine is under attack, but the essential goal is the destruction of the Western value system. We have no choice, we must respond to that by defeating the aggressor," said Đukanović.

 

Komšić: Candidate status for BIH

BiH Presidency member Željko Komšić expects the country to receive candidate status in December, but adds that this will further tighten European requirements.

 

This is not an administrative decision because BiH has fulfilled certain conditions, but a geopolitical decision that has deep connections with what is happening in Ukraine, Komšić assesses.

 

"Regardless of whether you can see whether the glass is half full or empty, we in Bosnia and Herzegovina must seize this opportunity," says Komšić.

 

Both Đukanović and Komšić stood for clearer positions of the Western partners and the EU in the Western Balkans integration process, as well as more decisive support for pro-European and not anti-European forces.

 

Đukanović said that the Euro-enthusiasm that existed six to seven years ago has waned in the region, and that, according to the data of the Serbian leader, it is now about 36 percent in that country, while the officials of North Macedonia say that whoever would go to the elections now would with the idea of European integration - he lost the election.

 

"This is the reality of the malignant activity of third parties at a time when the EU and NATO were reconsidering the further integration of the Western Balkans. Today we have the value devastation of societies that have returned to old ideas about border revision and religiously homogeneous states," said Đukanović.

 

Earlier today, participating in the conference, North Macedonia's Deputy Prime Minister for European Integration, Bojan Maričik, said that the Russian aggression against Ukraine showed that it is difficult to remain neutral in these times, and highlighted the importance of the NATO Alliance.

"If North Macedonia was not in NATO, our security and political situation would certainly be more complicated. The EU needs to make a clear plan as soon as possible with the year of enlargement in which the countries of the Western Balkans, or at least most of them, will become members," said Maričik.

 

Member of the European Parliament Vladimir Bilčik said during the conference that the process of enlargement to the Western Balkans is extremely difficult, because the countries of the region achieved insufficient results in that process.

 

He believes that Russia is trying to use the Western Balkans as an important front for its interests and a hybrid war against Europe.

 

"Europe has become a victim of domestic policies within the Balkans, and a choice needs to be made. Enlargement is the right choice, but it concerns huge reforms that will help the region break ties with the past and hostile ties, primarily with Russia. This will require time, courage and important decision", said Bilčik.

 

He also said that next week the European Parliament will vote on a resolution that will mark Russia as a country that finances terrorism and uses terrorist means.