Historian: Situation in Serbia Very Dangerous, Milosevic Was More Flexible than Vucic

Dubravka Stojanovic (BETAPHOTO/MEDIJA CENTAR BEOGRAD/DS)

Historian Dubravka Stojanovic has said that former president Slobodan Milosevic was far more willing to cede certain things than incumbent President Aleksandar Vucic and that the made the situation in Serbia "very dangerous."

"A violent government only knows violence. This is precisely now Serbia's main problem, because the government only understands violence," Stojanovic said in an interview with the July 13 edition of the NIN weekly, when asked whether she had the impression that the government was responding to resistance against violence with greater violence.

She said that the authorities were the ones generating violence and had closed all channels for a peaceful solution to issues, while Milosevic was far more rational and willing to bend. She recalled that it was Milosevic who accepted opposition and student demands and fired the management of Belgrade TV and accepted the results of elections in 1996 and then withdrew on Oct. 5.

"Can you imagine Vucic accepting all of this? You can't. He is psychologically much more different and that makes the situation in Serbia very dangerous," Stojanovic said.