Former Diplomat on Serbia’s New Ambassador to U.S.: Belgrade’s Excessive Expectations

Dragan Šutanovac (BETAPHOTO/Milos Miškov)

Former diplomat Srecko Djukic stated on Jan. 16 that Serbia asking the new U.S. president’s agreement for the future Serbian ambassador, Dragan Sutanovac, was not unusual in diplomatic practice, and assessed that it was hard to say how much future relations between the two countries would depend on Sutanovac and that Belgrade’s “excessive expectations should be revised.”

The Serbian government appointed Sutanovac, a former president of the Democratic Party and defense minister, as the new ambassador to the U.S. on Jan. 16, the media in Belgrade have reported. Djukic told BETA that it was very hard to say how much the U.S.-Serbian relations would depend on the new ambassador in Washington, considering that the U.S. absolutely has other priorities, which are global in nature, and that Belgrade’s expectations were “excessive.”

He recollected that the U.S. had its global and regional interests and that “Serbia should seek its space for developing relations with the U.S. in that context.” “We have heard what Donald Trump listed as priorities and he has not mentioned one word about Serbia, or the Western Balkans, or the Balkans in general; our expectations should, therefore, be revised accordingly,” Djukic stated.