The Serbian President called Crimea and Donbass Ukrainian

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic in an interview with Bloomberg called Crimea and Donbass Ukrainian regions.

Quote. “For us, Crimea is Ukraine, Donbass is Ukraine. It will remain so, ”Vucic said in an interview.

• According to him, Serbia said from the very beginning that it could not and would not support a Russian invasion of Ukraine.
• Prior to this, the Serbian president spoke more cautiously about the status of the peninsula. Le Monde In 2018, he told : “If we recognized Crimea as part of Russia, this would mean that we would support the independence of Kosovo.” Similarly, a year later, Vucic spoke on Rossiya 24: “If we did this today, we would be given an analogy with Kosovo. They would say that according to this principle, Kosovo is also independent and that we no longer have the right to fight for it ”(quote from“ RIA Novosti ”).
• In an interview with Bloomberg, Vučić, who even studied Russian specifically to communicate with Russian presidents without intermediaries, clarified that he had not spoken to Putin for several months.

Context. Commenting on Vucic's latest statements, Bloomberg writes that Serbia, traditionally one of Russia's closest allies in Europe, is trying to distance itself from Moscow because of the war in Ukraine.

• This is not the first sign of growing tension between Belgrade and Moscow. On Tuesday, the President of Serbia demanded to stop the recruitment of citizens of the country in the Wagner PMC, which is increasing its activity in the country.