Army Union Protests New Salary Regulations

Milan Mojsilovic,Milos Vucevic, Raska, Dec.26 2022 ( Photo: Defense Ministry)

On Aug. 17, the Army Union of Serbia demanded that Defense Minister Milos Vucevic immediately countermand the “damaging and illegal” new regulations on military salaries and form a working group which will include representatives of the Union to preserve the ranks of “the few professional soldiers” the country has left.

“The latest amendments to the Serbian Army Professional Member Salary Regulations, which, again, were made behind closed doors and unilaterally imposed. . . prioritize certain army members while discriminating against others [and] are, obviously, the latest blow to the few professional soldiers, supervisors and civilians left in the Army,” the Union stated.

According to the press release, by introducing said changes, the Army’s and Defense Ministry’s top managers have “trampled all the principles of logical economics, of reason and of the decades-old orderly system which the [Serbia’s] military used to be.”

The statement stressed that “none of the Army’s professional members deny that their special-forces colleagues should receive higher salaries through various bonuses or that money should be used to stimulate young people to join [the Serbian] military’s elite unites, whose ranks remain unfilled, but not in their worst nightmares did anyone dream of discord being sowed in such a shameless and unjust manner.”