Serbia

Serbia, officially the Republic of Serbia (Serbian: Република Србија / Republika Srbija), is a landlocked country in Southeast Europe, covering the southern part of the Carpathian basin and the central part of the Balkans. Its capital is Belgrade. It is bordered by Hungary to the north, Romania to the northeast, Bulgaria to the southeast, North Macedonia to the south, Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina to the west, Kosovo to the south, and Montenegro to the southwest. It continues to claim Kosovo. Serbia’s current head of state is President Aleksandar Vučić, and its current head of government is Prime Minister Ana Brnabić.

Quotes

Serbia are a world-class team but in Davis Cup tennis the crowd are such an important factor.
- Jeremy Bates "Jeremy Bates - Serbia are a world-class team but in Davis Cup tennis the crowd are such an important factor."

I think that Serbia is not a country in which it is important what nationality you are and where you come from.
- Ana Brnabić, as quoted in "Red Star Belgrade Face Punishment for Anti-Muslim Banner" (31 January 2018), by Maja Zivanovic, Balkan Insight

In the late nineteenth century other peoples sought to follow the Italian and German example. Some - notably the Irish and the Poles, to say nothing of Bengalis and other Indians - saw nationhood as an alternative to subjugation by unsympathetic empires. A few, like the Czechs, were content to pursue greater autonomy within an existing imperial structure, keeping hold of the Habsburg nurse for fear of meeting something worse. The situation of the Serbs was different. At the Congress of Berlin (1878), along with the Montenegrins, they had recovered their independence from Ottoman rule. By 1900 their ambitions were to follow the Piedmontese and Prussian examples by expanding in the name of South Slav (Yugoslav) national unity. But how were they to achieve this? One obvious possibility was through war, the Italian and German method. But the odds against Serbia were steep. It was one thing to win a war against the crumbling Ottoman Empire (as happened when Serbia joined forces with Montenegro, Bulgaria and Greece in 1912) or against rival Balkan states (when the confederates quarrelled over the spoils of victory the following year). It was an altogether bigger challenge to take on Austria-Hungary, which was not only a more formidable military opponent, but also happened to be the principal market for Serbia's exports.
- Niall Ferguson, The War of the World: Twentieth-Century Conflict and the Descent of the West (2006), pp. 75-76

The Greek and Serb peoples will remain united until Doomsday.
- Vojislav Koštunica, What is Serbian-Greek Friendship? (3 December 2000)

It should be clear to all, after the past ten years, that NATO isn't attacking Serbia because of Milošević; it is attacking Milošević because of Serbia.
- Slobodan Milošević, The Subversion Of A Socialist State, By Edward W. Miller, April 2001

Kosovo is not a part of Serbia. It is the very heart of Serbia.
- Slobodan Milošević, Dusko Doder and Louise Branson Milosevic: Portrait of a Tyrant (1999).

In the past quite difficult years, Greece and its citizens have proved their original motives and their belief in the expression that 'you will know who your friends are, when you need them'. Huge amounts of humanitarian aid coming from Greece to Serbia and Montenegro, innumerous efforts to collect funds for rebuilding our country, hospitality extended to our children – mainly children of refugees – for a short or a long period of time in Greek families, all this is just a token of the Greek moves of true friendship and solidarity that we will never forget. Even today, as we speak, Greece realizes, being a true friend of ours, our goals and priorities and is helping us to achieve them. [...] The strong, historic and friendly relation between Serbia-Montenegro and Greece constitutes the most important foundation to improve any form of cooperation in the field of politics, economy, culture, sports or education...
- Svetozar Marović, Interview with the President of Serbia-Montenegro Mr. Svetozar Marovic November-December 2006

The Greek and the Serb people are united like a fist.
- Vladislav Jovanović, 1994

Greece and Serbia are two countries linked by ancient and inextricable bonds. Our relationship is lost in the depths of time. Serbian culture and religion were greatly influenced by our common roots in the great civilisation of Byzantium.
- Dimitrios K. Katsoudas Secretary General for European Affairs, 3 May 2007[www.mfa.gr/www.mfa.gr/Articles/el-GR/03052007_1526_alp.htm] Serbia on the Road to Europe; Problems and Perspective

Why four great powers should fight over Serbia no fellow can understand.
- John Burns, John Burns quotes

In Serbia a lot of people hate me because they want to westernise, not understanding that the western world is bipolar, with very good things and very bad things. Since they don't have experience of the west, they even believe that a western pile of shit is actually pie.
- Emir Kusturica, as quoted in The Guardian (4 March 2005)

The Serbs are our true friends [...]
- Constantine Mitsotakis
Setting his goal as the creation of a ‘Greater Serbia’, Milošević deployed the Yugoslav National Army (JNA) — then the fourth largest army in Europe — against would-be secessionist republics. Meanwhile, Serb separatist forces within such republics were encouraged to rise up. Lacking a large Serb population, Slovenia was allowed by Milosevic, after a ‘ten-day war’, to go its own way after declaring independence in June 1991. Not so with Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina: he was determined that their sizeable Serb minority populations would remain within Yugoslavia. Milosevic loyalists helped carve out Serb autonomous enclaves in each: first Milan Babic in the Serb-dominated Krajina region of Croatia, and then General Ratko Mladić and the psychiatrist-turned-demagogue Radovan Karadžić, within Bosnia. Paramilitary gangs bearing outlandish names — Arkan’s Tigers, the White Eagles, the Chetniks — rampaged through Serb-run Croatia and Bosnia, bringing death and destruction wherever they went. In the process they endowed the lexicon of conflict with a new term, ethnicko cis cenje terena — literally the ‘ethnic cleansing of the earth’, or simply ethnic cleansing.
- Simon Sebag Montefiore, Monsters: History's Most Evil Men and Women (2009), pp. 361-362

As a Greek I swear eternal friendship with the Serb people.
- George Papandreou, in Belgrade (15 March 2003)

As Hellenic Nationalists, we express complete support with our Serb brothers, which was genuinely expressed in the past and we declare our solidarity in the common struggle for National Dignity and Sovereignty. Kosovo is Serbia!
- Golden Dawn Statement [posted on the Serbian Consulate in Thessaloniki], 1 March 2008, Thessaloniki Quotations from various Greek and Serb leaders attesting to the close ties between the peoples.

It is very important to send a new signal of confidence and hope that this (Montenegro, Serbia, Albania, North Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo) accession (into the European Union) process is wanted by the EU (European Union) with great seriousness, and that it also has a realistic chance if everyone makes an effort.
- Olaf Scholz, cited in: "Scholz backs giving chance to Western Balkans on EU membership" in Aljazeera, 10 June 2022.

In general, I am an opponent of Pan-Slavism. I do not think that we should be doing anything either in the Balkans or with the Slavs. But the West has now tipped the balance very heavily against Serbia, as if she is to blame for everything. But it's not the Serbs or Croats or Bosnians who are guilty. In Yugoslavia the problems began for the same reason as in the U.S.S.R. The communists--they had Tito, we had Lenin and Stalin--charted out arbitrary, ethnically nonsensical and historically unjustifiable internal administrative boundaries, and for years moved inhabitants from one region to another. And when--also in the period of a few days--Yugoslavia began to fall apart, the leading powers of the West, with inexplicable haste and irresponsibility, rushed to recognize these states within their artificial borders. Therefore, for the exhausting, bloody war which is today convulsing the unfortunate peoples of the former Yugoslavia, the leaders of the Western powers must share the blame with Tito..
- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Interview With Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn on the New Russia and Ukraine (May 1994), by Paul Klebnikov, in the (9 May 1994), issue of Forbes magazine
I am among friends. And this friendship of ours [between Greeks and Serbs] has been proved in practice. And we shall do this in the future as well with words and with deeds.
- Konstantinos Stephanopoulos, October 2003

We have more in common than differences. The Greek people stood by our side more than any other nation. Up there we do not say the Greeks, we say our brothers. Whatever happens here – let's hope the time will never come – they will be by your side in no time. They are yours. You have won their brotherhood. They are so proud for my Greek origin both mine and my husband's. For the fact that he chose a Greek woman too, like his grandfather did.
- HRH Crown Princess Katherine, 18 December 2004

I believe in Serbia that moves forward - towards the European Union. There will be no going back for Serbia, only forwards.
- Boris Tadić, at the presidential inauguration ceremony.

Serbia is on its European path, but Serbia has to live, and has friends in the U.S. but it also has friends and it is not ashamed of them in Moscow and in Beijing.
- Aleksandar Vučić, as quoted in "Serbia's Vucic plays down hopes for quick political deal with Kosovo" (22 September 2020), Reuters

We don't have children to throw away, we have to protect Serbia. If only we hadn't participated in all the wars of the 20th century, we would be bigger than the Netherlands. We have to try to preserve peace, but not give away what is ours.
- Aleksandar Vučić, as quoted in "Vučić at 14th anniversary of the SNS: 'Serbia is stronger. Surrender isn't an option.'" (21 October 2022), B92

Rumania, Serbia, and Montenegro should be evacuated; occupied territories restored; Serbia accorded free and secure access to the sea; and the relations of the several Balkan states to one another determined by friendly counsel along historically established lines of allegiance and nationality; and international guarantees of the political and economic independence and territorial integrity of the several Balkan states should be entered into.
- Woodrow Wilson, 14 Points, 1918