NATO: No Events Planned with Serbia, We Remain Committed to the Partnership

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Following Serbian government’s decision to suspend all joint military exercises with its partners for the sake of preserving the country’s military neutrality, NATO has announced it has no special events planned with Serbia in the near future and that it remains dedicated to its partnership with Belgrade.

“We have no specific events planned with Serbia for the coming months, but we remain committed to [our] partnership in the interest of stability and security in the region,” an unnamed NATO official told both Radio Free Europe and Voice of America in the evening of Sep. 9.

The official added that the Western military alliance values its “long-standing partnership with Serbia.” ”Like all of our partnerships, our partnership with Serbia is founded on the needs of the partner state,” it was further stated.

The Serbian Defense Ministry previously announced that the Serbian government decided to suspend all military exercises and activities it had planned with its partners in order to maintain Serbia’s “position of military neutrality and avoid or at least mitigate the consequences of the intensified attacks” on Serbia’s politics and economy.

According to Serbian Defense Minister Aleksandar Vulin, Serbia is under “terrible and undeserved pressure” from the EU, adding that the country is expected to “leave the planned exercise with Belarus or risk losing [its] European future and even greater pressure on its politics, and the Serbian population in Kosovo and Metohija and Republika Srpska.”