The countries of the Western Balkans are a common priority of America and Europe, as shown by the decision of US President Joseph Biden to expand the scope of the decree, which defines sanctions for individuals and organizations from the region, whose activities threaten peace and stability in this area, said Sonja Biserko, President of the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Serbia for Gradski Radio.
“US President Joseph Biden and German Chancellor Angela Merkel have reiterated on several occasions that they need to finish starting work in the Balkans and put an end to all destabilizing activities at any time in the region. Their attention will be focused on all countries in the region, especially Serbia, as the most relevant factor of destabilization”, said Biserko in the show “View of the yard”.
When asked which leader could be on the American “black list”, Biserko is of the opinion that the President of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Milorad Dodik, will certainly be one of them, considering all his activities that continuously destroy the fabric of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“Dodik is not the only one! The list of those who undermine the stability and territorial integrity of the countries of the Western Balkans from BiH, Serbia, and even Montenegro, will be long,” Biserko said.
She points out that the project of Greater Serbia has not been abandoned, and the “Serbian world” is its modification.
“These are imperial aspirations that the state leadership of Serbia does not want to recognize. They are recycling old terms in order to avoid the term Greater Serbia that was circulating in the 1990s,” Biserko said, adding that America was determined to solve all security challenges in the region: terrorism, organized crime, corruption, but also the problem of migrants.
Through letters, the President of the United States addressed regional leaders, asking them to cooperate in the domain of democratization, reforms, respect for human rights, freedom of the media, as the greatest achievements of civilization.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic is facing a loss of Western support, Biserko emphasizes, due to his non-transparent relationship with Russia and China.
“Cooperation with China or Russia is not a stumbling block, but the problem is in what way and in which spheres that cooperation is realized,” Biserko emphasizes.
She hopes that NATO, which will seek to include Kosovo and Bosnia and Herzegovina in the Alliance, will play a key role in consolidating the Western Balkans. As he says, if it does not go in that direction, Serbia will remain isolated.
Official Belgrade, the Bosnian entity of Republika Srpska and the parliamentary majority in Montenegro are counting on the support of Russia and China, but those expectations are exaggerated, Biserko believes, since these countries are looking after their own interests.
“Russia is working to prevent Serbia's integration into the EU. On the other hand, Serbia is inactive in the dynamics of negotiations with the EU, since it has not opened a single chapter in the last two years”, explains the president of the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights.
Biserko is of the opinion that Russia has penetrated so far because Serbia has turned its back on both the region and the West, because it does not accept the values that are imperative for EU membership.
“The media are under the control of the state, every critical voice is silenced or is constantly targeted, the standard of citizens is stagnating or collapsing,” Biserko points out.
Whether the United States and the European Union will really endure in that direction, which they talk about every day, depends on the scope of American sanctions against individuals who are trying to destroy the architecture they established in the 1990s in this area, Biserko concludes.