President Aleksandar Vucic said Friday that Serbia is paying a high price due to the overall geopolitical situation and is in an extremely difficult situation without any fault of its own.
Vucic said in an address to the nation that the most important topic is the issue of Kosovo.
"I will talk about this and about our people in Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is about the overall pressure on Serbia and the Serbian people, primarily because of our military neutrality, our attitude towards the conflict in Ukraine, and Serbia's position that it condemns the attack on a sovereign country, but does not join the sanctions against Russia. The third reason is related to both previous ones, is that Western countries feel a lot of pressure due to the advancement of Russian forces and the uncertainty of how the war will end, and pressured by possible future policies from Moscow that will be based on what is often called the Kosovo precedent." said Vucic.
He said Serbia and Serbian people are often targeted because it is necessary to take all of it out of the hands of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Vucic warned Wednesday that difficult days await his country and said he would soon inform the nation about the challenges.
''Difficult days are ahead for Serbia. At this moment, it is not easy to say what kind of news we have received in the last 48 hours," he said on social media but indicated that it is related to direct threats to Serbia's national interests.
''They directly threaten our vital national interests, both Serb and Republika Srpska,'' he said Wednesday.
Vucic said that since Albin Kurti became prime minister in Kosovo in 2021, there have been 494 ethnically motivated attacks on Serbs.
''Pristina has continuously taken escalating moves and since then there have been 494 ethnically motivated attacks on Serbs and the Serbian church, and in the previous period of nine years, when Kurti was not in power, we only had 170 more attacks," said Vucic.
He said he would present key facts about Kosovo and Metohija, which show the seriousness of the position that Serbia is facing, and especially the people of Kosovo and Metohija.
Vucic has made similar remarks in the past when the EU and the US pressured him and the Serbian government to recognize Kosovo's independence and allow the country's integration into international organizations.
Meanwhile, Kosovo's latest move targeting the use of the Serbian dinar in the country has sparked a new dispute in the region.
Kosovo adopted the euro for cash payment transactions on Feb. 1 despite concerns by ethnic Serbs in the north.
The central bank announced the decision Jan. 18 and said currencies other than the euro can only be used in Kosovo for physical safekeeping or bank accounts.
The decision triggered outrage because ethnic Serb communities in Kosovo had been using the dinar, the official currency of neighboring Serbia, at state and commercial institutions. Many local Serbs have an attachment or even allegiance to Serbia.
The parties held a series of meetings in Brussels as part of the dialogue process between Belgrade and Pristina.
But a final solution or decision has yet to come out of the meetings.
