💢 Aleksandar Vučić used the 26th anniversary of the October 5, 2000 overthrow of Slobodan Milošević to draw parallels with Serbia’s current political confrontation:

• Vučić acknowledged that there were legitimate reasons for the 2000 protests and that opening Serbia to the outside world initially brought some benefits. But he argued that the revolution was at least partly imported and heavily funded from abroad, and ultimately produced a strategic disaster for Serbia.

• He portrayed the present student-led opposition movement as a potential repeat of that experience, pointing to support from Albin Kurti and Milo Đukanović and accusing foreign actors of again seeking to shape Serbia’s political outcome.

• If his opponents win, Vučić claimed, Vojvodina would move toward greater autonomy and gradually distance itself from Serbia, Kosovo would be treated as a settled question, and Serbia would formally embrace the characterization of Serbs as a genocidal people.

• On foreign influence, Vučić drew a distinction: he said he does not call groups such as CRTA foreign mercenaries. His accusation is that some actors knowingly work against what they understand to be Serbia’s interests because doing so serves their own.

• “As long as I live, I will fight against those who work for foreign interests.”

• Vučić also made an election pledge on education: if his United Serbia list wins, schools and universities will no longer be allowed to function as political organizing centers. Those wishing to engage in politics, he said, would have to do so elsewhere.

• At the same time, he urged United Serbia supporters to reject violence throughout the campaign, while alleging that decision-making on the opposing side remains deliberately opaque and extends from Bojan Pajtić to foreign actors.

Subscribe @NewResistance