Serbian Speaker to EP President: Wartime Image of Rapporteur for Serbia Compromises His Credibility

Tonino Picula (BETAPHOTO/MILOS MISKOV)

Ana Brnabic, the speaker of the Serbian parliament, expressed on Aug. 9 deep concern and dissatisfaction in a letter to European Parliament president Roberta Metsola after Tonino Picula, the European body's rapporteur for Serbia, posted a wartime photograph of himself holding a rifle on the X social media platform.

The Serbian speaker's letter to Metsola, printed in full by the Novosti daily, reads that the post was concerning coming from a person entrusted to be an impartial and credible mediator between the EP and Serbia and that such behavior seriously compromised Picula's credibility and impartiality in his official role, "casting a shadow over the integrity of the European Parliament itself."

"It sends a harmful message to the citizens of Serbia about the values and principles that the European Union professes to espouse -- reconciliation, tolerance, dialogue and the honoring of all victims, whatever their ethnicity," Brnabic's letter reads.

Former Serbian president Boris Tadic also said on Aug. 9 that Picula should be removed as rapporteur after the post. Picula recently said commenting on the 30th anniversary of the Croatian military and police Operation Storm against the Republic of Serb Krajina that advocating peace, the strengthening of democracy and balanced economic progress should be permanent guideposts in the development of Croatian society. Accompanying the post, he attached a wartime photograph of himself posing in a military uniform with a rifle in his hands.