Opposition MP: Progressives from Parliamentary Friendship Group Insulted Bundestag Guests

Robert Kozma (BETAPHOTO/MILAN ILIC)

Robert Kozma, an MP of the oppositional Green-Left Front, has claimed that Progressive Party of Serbia members of the Parliamentary Group for Friendship with Germany insulted guests from the German Bundestag after they made critical statements about Serbia during a Nov. 19 meeting in Belgrade.

“The representatives of the Serbian Progressive Party voiced their displeasure quite loudly, acted rudely, calling out to and insulting the guests. The German ambassador [Anke Konrad] was right there. The meeting was held without any kind of order. The moderator gave the floor to speakers at her own whim, favoring representatives of the ruling majority,” Kozma said following the sit-down between the Serbian MP Group and two German visitors: Anton Hofreiter, the chairman of the Bundestag’s Committee on European Union Affairs, and Boris Mijatovic, a member of said Committee.

According to Kozma, the introductory address by Hofreiter and Mijatovic – both MEPs from the Alliance 90/The Greens – more or less reiterated the European Parliament’s recent conclusions regarding Serbia and the European Commission’s latest report on Serbia’s progress.

“They said that if Serbia wants to become a member of the European Union it must pay attention to the political criteria: it has to be a democratic country with the rule of law, free media, where the prosecutors’ offices and judiciary cannot be controlled by the regime,” Kozma told Nova online.

The two German guests “especially focused on the treatment of journalists and control of media with national broadcasting frequencies, where [Serbian President] Aleksandar Vucic and representatives of the ruling regime are dominant presences while the opposition is virtually absent,” Kozma said.

“Serbian Progressive Party MPs shouted comments and insults during the German MEPs’ address. . . At one point, the President of the Parliamentary Group for Friendship with Germany Marija Zdravkovic stopped Boris Mijatovic mid-address because he criticized [Serbia’s] media environment. He was absolutely shocked because such things don’t happen in democratic countries,” Kozma described.

According to the Green-Left Front MP, the situation culminated when the German guests spoke up against such treatment, stating they refuse to be insulted and are well informed about the situation in Serbia.

“At one point Hofreiter said that Serbia is the one petitioning to join the EU and that it must be a democracy to do so. If that’s not to its liking, it should say so openly since no one is forcing [the country] to join the EU. MPs from the ruling party reacted quite loudly to this statement, claiming they were being insulted and that Serbia’s hospitality was being abused,” Kozma went on.

The Nov. 18 meeting between members of the Serbian National Assembly’s Defense and Internal Affairs Committee and the chair of the Bundestag’s Defense Committee, Thomas Rowekamp, was similarly explosive, with Rowekamp – who is a member of German Chancellor Friedrich Merz ruling Christian Democratic Union – indignantly leaving the conference before it was set to end.