Analyzing The Scandal Over Serbia’s Latest Anti-Russian Vote At The UNGA

Defying two of the three Great Powers with the greatest influence over Serbia was an epic error of judgement, hence Vucic’s unbelievable claim about some vague “mistake” being responsible for this.

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic claimed that his country mistakenly voted in support of an anti-Russian resolution at the UNGA, the explanation of which was accepted by Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, but there’s much more to this scandal than observers might think. UNGA votes aren’t made by mistake, but they’re also only symbolic since all that matters is what the UNSC decrees. In any case, Serbia already voted for several anti-Russian resolutions, none of which Vucic claimed were a “mistake”.

These include the one from early March 2022 condemning the special operation, the next one later that month condemning Russia for creating a humanitarian crisis, April 2022’s suspending Russia from the Human Rights Council, October 2022’s condemning Russia’s annexation of Ukrainian land, and February 2023’s calling on Russia to unilaterally withdraw from Ukraine. The only one of the six prior UNGA resolutions on Ukraine that Serbia abstained from was November 2022’s for reparations from Russia.

Serbia’s support for almost all of the UNGA’s anti-Russian resolutions over the past three years had no negative effect on its ties with Russia. The Kremlin seemingly concluded that this was done under Western pressure, plus it knows how purely symbolic these votes are anyhow. What matters most to Russia is that Serbia continues to defy Western sanctions. This is apparently even more important to it than the reports from 2023, which Vucic denied, of Serbia indirectly arming Ukraine.

What’s surprising about Serbia’s latest vote though is how it aligned with the EU instead of the US, the latter of which teamed up with Russia to veto the UNGA’s anti-Russian resolution and then joined forces with it once again later that same day to approve a neutral resolution at the UNSC. Readers can learn more about their significance of their diplomatic choreography here but referencing it in this analysis is meant to show that Serbia evidently felt more pressured by the EU than the US this entire time.

After all, if Serbia was following the US’ lead over the EU’s, then it would have shifted its policy towards the conflict at the UNGA just like the US just did by abstaining from that body’s latest anti-Russian resolution. Instead, Serbia’s position mirrored the EU’s, which it always has on every such occasion till this one except for November 2022’s resolution for reparations from Russia. The only reason why Serbia abstained from that one was because it feared setting a precedent that Kosovo could exploit against it.

What’s most interesting about the abovementioned observation is that Trump’s Envoy for Special Missions Ric Grenell, who served as his Envoy for Serbia and Kosovo during his first term, has recently feuded with Kosovo’s leader on X. That’s good news for Serbia so one would have thought that it would have vetoed the latest UNGA resolution alongside the US as a show of thanks, which would have finally aligned Serbia with Russia on this issue at the UN, instead of voting alongside the EU against both.

Defying two of the three Great Powers with the greatest influence over Serbia was an epic error of judgement, which Vucic either realized on his own or was made aware of by his advisors, hence his unbelievable claim about some vague mistake being responsible for that infamous vote. This wasn’t meant to appeal to Russia since Serbia voted against it on five out of the prior six resolutions till this one but to signal to the US that Belgrade now wants to align itself more with Washington than with Brussels.

Therein lies the real reason behind Vucic’s volte-face. Serbia now realizes that the transatlantic rift between the US and EU, which is caused by the nascent Russian-US “New Détente”, is real and can have serious implications for its interests. Vucic thus clumsily recalibrated his country’s policy towards the Ukrainian Conflict after the vote even though he should have done so ahead of time. Nonetheless, it’s better late than never, and it’ll be interesting to see what effect this might have on the Kosovo issue.