The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia called on Belgrade to clarify the statement of the President of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, regarding the possible sale of ammunition to the European Union, Reuters reported.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said at a regular briefing on November 7 that Moscow is seeking clarification of Vučić’s announcement that Serbia is ready to sell ammunition to EU countries, “even if it could end up in Ukraine.”
“Serbia has repeatedly assured Russia that its ammunition will not fall into Ukrainian hands. That is why Vučić’s comments require an official explanation from Belgrade,” Zakharova said in Moscow on Friday.
The German magazine for politics and culture, Cicero, published an interview with the President of Serbia on October 30, in which, allegedly, Vučić expressed Serbia’s readiness to export larger quantities of ammunition to the EU and that he has no problem with it if it ends up on the battlefield in Ukraine.
“Let the buyers do what they want with the goods,” Vučić said in an interview with Cicero.
Serbia does not supply weapons and military equipment to the parties in conflict anywhere in the world, said the State Secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Serbia (MFA) Nevena Jovanović on November 7.
In response to Zakharova’s statement, she stated that Belgrade strictly adheres to international regulations and rules of the United Nations.
She added that the MFA expresses surprise at Zakharova’s comment regarding this topic.
“We point out that Serbia is a sovereign and independent state that makes decisions exclusively in accordance with its national interests. We expect representatives of friendly countries to respect this fact,” Jovanović announced.
She also stated that Serbia is the only country in Europe outside the Commonwealth of Independent States, an alliance of ten states of the former Soviet Union, that has not imposed sanctions on the Russian Federation.
“It is worth remembering that our country has not opened a single chapter in the process of accession to the European Union since December 2021, even though it could have. It is interesting, certainly not by chance, that this date coincides with the beginning of the war in Ukraine,” concluded State Secretary Jovanović.
She added that Serbia, as she stated, will continue to conduct its policy in accordance with its own interests.
The newspaper ‘Ukrainska Pravda’, after Vučić’s interview with Cicero, announced that the ammunition warehouses in Serbia are full, with particularly large stocks of mortar shells.
“Serbia is ready to offer everything it has to friends in Europe and this is a phenomenal contribution to European security,” said Vučić, writes Cicero.
He added that Serbia is absolutely ready to cooperate with the EU on military matters and is awaiting responses from European countries to its proposal.
Moscow then reacted with a statement by the spokesman for the President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin, Dmitry Peskov, that Russia understands “the unprecedented pressure being exerted on Serbia” and described the issue of Serbian arms exports as “a not at all simple story.”
The Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) announced in June that Serbian companies were increasing indirect arms supplies to Ukraine through EU countries such as the Czech Republic and Bulgaria.
Belgrade announced at the same time that it had suspended the export of ammunition, weapons and military equipment produced in Serbia, following criticism from Moscow and in the midst of the Israeli-Iranian conflict.
President Vučić stated on June 23 that ammunition would be delivered only to domestic barracks until further notice and confirmed his statement to Israeli media that Serbia sold ammunition to Israel after the attack of the Palestinian movement Hamas on Israel on October 7, 2023.
“The situation is different today. We have stopped literally everything,” Vučić said.
The Ministry of Defense of Serbia and the Ministry of Internal and Foreign Trade did not answer the questions sent by Radio Free Europe on November 6 – whether weapons and military equipment have been exported from Serbia since June 23, when the decision was made, until today.
Belgrade has repeatedly denied that Serbia directly exports weapons to Ukraine or Russia and stated that it cannot influence whether Serbian weapons from third countries will end up on the Ukrainian front.
How much Serbia exports is not known, as there have been no reports from the Ministry of Trade for years.
The last such document, according to the search of the competent authorities’ portals, was published for 2022.
That report states that in the period from 2005 to 2022, the total value of realized export licenses for dual-use goods was $77.97 million.
On the other hand, Serbia informs international organizations about arms exports.
Serbia’s annual reports on the export and import of conventional weapons from 2015 to 2024 are available on the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) page of the international Arms Trade Treaty, headquartered in Geneva, of which 166 countries are signatories. They show the structure of exports but not the value.
According to the ATT report, in 2024 Serbia exported 16,185 large-caliber artillery systems to Azerbaijan (6,500), Bulgaria (6,250), the United States of America (1,757), South Africa (1,310), Uganda, the United Arab Emirates, Malawi, Israel, Turkey, India, and Nigeria.
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Source: Radio Slobodna Evropa; Photo: ATA Images