Tepic Asks EU to Call Things Their Rightful Name

Marinika Tepic (BETAPHOTO/MILOS MISKOV)

On Jan. 9, Freedom and Justice Party vice president Marinika Tepic informed EU spokesman Peter Stano that the source of claims about the West interfering in Serbia’s electoral process and staging the opposition protests in Belgrade is not Russia – as Stano maintained the day before – but rather President Aleksandar Vucic and his Progressive Party of Serbia.

In an open letter to Stano, Tepic added that Vucic completely controls, shapes and disseminates such information through the statements of his officials and media outlets. “The Russian side undeniably relishes such claims, but Russian Ambassador to Serbia [Aleksandr] Botsan-Kharchenko himself just as undeniably stated that he was told by President Vucic that the protests were staged by the West. And it is equally undeniable that Aleksandar Vucic never refuted Ambassador Botsan-Kharchenko’s statement,” Tepic reminded the EU spokesman.

According to Tepic, another undeniable fact is that Prime Minister Ana Brnabic publicly thanked Russian agencies for their aid, which Brnabic “pompously publicized in all domestic tabloids and on TV stations directly controlled by Aleksandar Vucic, such as the RTS public service, Pink TV, Prva TV, B92 TV, Happy [TV], followed by the tabloids and [web] portals Informer, Srpski Telegraf, Alo, Blic, Novosti, Politika.”

“In light of this and the numerous other proof of the ruling regime’s anti-European policy, I ask you to begin using appropriate words for describing what we are living here and going through in [our] fight for democracy, freedom and justice,” she concluded.