Friends of Western Balkans: The Attitude towards Serbia Is a Test of the EU’s Credibility

Serbia, EU flags (BETAPHOTO/MILAN ILIC)

A network called the Friends of the Western Balkans (FoWB), which gathers representatives of the European social democratic community, has said that the attitude towards Serbia is a test of the European Union’s (EU) credibility, adding that the Union must stop looking away from “the kleptocratic apparatus” led by President Aleksandar Vucic. 
 
In a statement on its Nov. 21 meeting in Belgrade, issued on Dec. 8, FoWB said they “stand with the citizens and students of Serbia, demanding a state that serves its people, not an autocracy that is heading towards dictatorship.” 

“Their call is the European call: rule of law, accountability, free media, and genuinely free and fair elections. In the wake of the Novi Sad tragedy, Serbia’s democratic backsliding and state violence in the last decade, systemic failures must be named and responsibility ensured. This is a test of the EU’s credibility. The Union must stop looking away from the kleptocratic apparatus led by President Vucic, intimidation of democratic forces and anti-EU rhetoric,” it is said in the statement. 

After the organization’s eighth meeting in Belgrade, which discussed the situation in Serbia, the future of enlargement and implications of the European Commission’s proposal for the 2028-2034 Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF), FoWB welcomed the Commission’s firmer tone in the 2025 Enlargement Package and the European Parliament’s latest resolution with a clear message that the EU will not trade democracy for ‘stabilitocracy’. It also said that the EU “must now match its words with action and stand decisively with the people of Serbia and their European future.”

The FoWB called on the European Commission, the Council and the member states “to act in a unified way and to adopt targeted sanctions against those responsible for serious human rights violations, apply strict rule-of-law conditionality and redirect EU funds towards independent media, civil society and justice reform, while maintaining important funding for the educational and healthcare systems.” 

“All political engagement should be tied to concrete progress on OSCE/ODIHR recommendations, including implementation of the full voter register audit,” it is said in the statement signed by more than 30 members of the network, including members of national and European parliaments, political foundations, parties and civil society organizations from across Europe and the Western Balkan region.

Among them are European Parliament Rapporteur for Serbia Tonino Picula, MEPs Andreas Schieder and Kathleen Van Brempt, the former mediator in the talks between the regime and the opposition, Knut Fleckenstein, and the international secretaries of the Democratic Party and the Freedom and Justice Party, Ksenija Markovic i Konstantin Samofalov respectively.

FoWB repeated the call on the Serbian authorities to end repression against protesters, the academic community, political opposition, journalists and civil society, to end impunity for those responsible, to conduct a fully transparent, independent investigation into the Novi Sad tragedy, addressing corruption and negligence resulting in clear and swift judicial verdicts, to organize and guarantee free, fair and necessary snap elections, to safeguard media and academic freedom, and to immediately end all the arbitrary detention and release all political prisoners.