Vucic: Serbia Must Balance Problems Others in Europe Do Not Have

Aleksandar Vucic (BETAPHOTO/MILAN ILIC)

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic has stated that he was a person who was exposed to tremendous daily attacks and that claims were being made about the regime in Serbia being autocratic, but that the people in Serbia were still supporting him and that opinion polls in recent months had shown that he was in the lead.

“If there is anyone who is constantly attacked in heinous ways in their own country – it is I. Every day, I am depicted as Hitler and then – it is claimed that Serbia had an authoritarian or autocratic regime. Honestly – in what country is it possible that the premises of the ruling party are attacked 800 times since taking office? On 29 occasions, our offices were completely destroyed or burned,” Vucic stated in an interview to the German online magazine Cicero.

Asked about the international non-governmental organization Freedom House no longer counting Serbia among free democracies, due to the abolishing of the division of power and his influence on the party, the parliament and the media, Vucic extended an invitation to Freedom House to come to Serbia and “have a first-hand look and reach a fair conclusion.”

In the interview to Cicero, the online magazine for political culture, Vucic denied the claims about the police in Serbia using a sound weapon against the demonstrators, declaring: “I do not lie to the public,” and dismissing the MEPs’ criticism over the use of such a weapon by saying that they only repeated the media claims and that “various interests, business interests” were involved.