Accusing the United States of America (USA) of enabling the emergence of the "Serbian world" - the idea of the political unification of Serbs, Milo Djukanovic continues to create enemies on duty, deliberately forgetting both its role as the initiator of sharp ethnic divisions and the fact that the West was the patron of the "Đukanović world", enabling the Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS) to remain in power, while Montenegro was drowning in crime and corruption.
This is how the interlocutors of "Vijesti" interpret the criticisms that the former long-time Montenegrin president and prime minister recently expressed against the US and the West, assessing that their policy towards the Western Balkans was "completely wrong" and "pro-Russian".
In an interview with "Al Jazeera" broadcast on January 30, he said that he appreciated the West's decisive response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which has lasted almost three years, but that during that time, the same policy in the former Yugoslavia "blew the wind in the sails of the 'Serbian world'."
"So, of course, the question arises - why is this so, why did it happen like this? I think that the Western world's policy towards this region was completely wrong. So, including the hypocrisy of always emphasizing that this was European policy, which the United States of America was just following. No, that is untrue - this policy was created by the State Department, and Europe was just following...", stated Đukanović.
The former head of the DPS said that the US State Department failed to achieve its goals - to separate Serbia from Russia and secure an agreement between Serbia and Kosovo "that will legitimize Kosovo in international organizations", and that the basic mistake was that, "guided by their selfish interest, to only achieve their goal", they believed that "everything else was a matter of agreement".
"So the point of the agreement was to allow the authorities in Belgrade to show off a little in this region. And they did it not a little, but a little more, and according to the same formula that (former president of Serbia and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia) did it." Slobodan) Milosevic in the 1990s, declaring the threat to Serbs in neighboring countries, not caring that they were thereby undermining the sovereignty of those countries...", added Đukanović.
"We know who the progenitor of division is"
Diplomat and former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Montenegro Miodrag Lekić, assesses for "Vijesti" that Đukanović, apparently, "does not consider himself to belong only to history, but to the political present, perhaps thinking of the future as well", and that it seems that "the judiciary does not bother him much either". Therefore, he says, the impression from a recent interview is that the former head of state has freed himself from "the previously visible and understandable fear of the institutions of justice".
"That he feels again the way he has felt for decades, that is - as a person outside the legal system, and probably therefore aggressively obsessed again, with continuing the inciting goals of sowing hatred and division in Montenegro," claims Lekić.
He said that everyone knows that "the production of enemies on duty" was an important element of Đukanović's plutocratic rule, and that he easily found them in Montenegro, the region, and even the world. On the domestic level, by creating them, Lekić says, he systematically encouraged national divisions, and now he sees the Americans as patrons of ethnic divisions in the Balkans and in Montenegro. This, according to the interlocutor of "Vijesti", is interesting because Đukanović, "the impression was created that he was an American client for a long period of time...".
"It is not unknown in history that the USA, undoubtedly a democratic country, through its services cooperatively accepts compromising individuals and groups with a certain pragmatic goal. And according to the historically known strategy and motto: 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' - it doesn't matter what kind of person he is," adds Lekić.
Recalling that Djukanovic's enemies in recent times have been Russia "and Serbia, which is seen as a little Russia", the diplomat notes that it is difficult to understand what the long-time highest Montenegrin official wanted to achieve by constructing the Americans "who are shifting responsibility for ethnic divisions and the dominant consciousness of ethnocentrism". Lekić wonders if Djukanovic is aiming to make it forgotten that he is the progenitor of "rough divisions in Montenegro with a cynical strategy - divide, divide and rule".
"Regardless of the fact that the government after 2020 was neither capable nor mature enough to notice the destructiveness of the dominant state and the rise of ethnic particularities in an increasingly disintegrated society and state, which represents, along with other serious problems, perhaps the greatest danger in the country - not only for the functioning, but also for the duration of the Montenegrin state - it is still impossible to forget the greatest role of Đukanović in that process. All this in order to reach the numerical majority that allows him to remain in power, and with it corruption, the criminalization of Montenegrin society and the state itself," Lekić concludes.
This is not the first time that Đukanović has "slapped" the West - so far, he has criticized the international community on several occasions, albeit less harshly, claiming that the three-decade DPS government was removed in 2020 with the "echo of the international community", that "superficiality of international politics" can sometimes cost a lot, that international partners see the situation in Montenegro as slightly better after Russia's aggression on Ukraine, "but still not good enough"... Similar narratives have also come from DPS officials.
"It's not a criticism, it's a cry"
Unlike Lekić, the editor-in-chief of the weekly "Monitor" Milena Perović claims that Djukanovic's criticism of the US shows that he is afraid of the judiciary and that he has reason to be.
"A judiciary that will be free from politics, that will have a free hand. War crimes cases are being opened, including the deportation of Bosnian refugees, which could cost it dearly. There are other cases, volumes have been written about them...", she tells "Vijesti".
Perović assesses that Đukanović is criticizing the West, namely the USA, today because he believes that their policies enabled the "Serbian world", while deliberately forgetting that the same West also enabled the "Đukanović world", when it treated the former president as a "factor of stability in the region", while the country was "sinking into crime, corruption and autocracy".
"Criticism of the West, after it lost its privileged position, is not criticism, but a cry. Which again smells of fear... Montenegro should not choose between the 'Serbian world' and the 'Đukanović world'; it must find the path of a truly European, democratic society," the interviewee says.
Thanks to the West, in 1997, Djukanovic broke with Milosevic and his nationalist policies, which were an important factor during the wars of the XNUMXs in the attempt to create a "Greater Serbia", which part of the domestic, regional and international public identifies with the "Serbian world" project.
After that, Đukanović repeatedly played the “peace factor” card, with which he secured Western support for his continued hold on state office, and thus consolidate his power. There are several examples of the West standing up for him, and one of the most striking is the statement of the former US ambassador to Serbia and Montenegro. of William Montgomery from July 2021, that the United States had a ship in Cavtat (Croatia) with a team from the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) whose sole job was to rescue Đukanović if Milošević “went after him”.
Montgomery then said in an interview with the Croatian newspaper "Večernji list" that in the 1990s it was difficult to raise funds to finance Đukanović's government, and that therefore the West began to allow tobacco smugglers "to operate from Montenegro."
"We turned our heads and decided not to see this smuggling," he said, among other things.
The US Embassy in Podgorica told "Vijesti", when asked how it viewed Đukanović's messages, that they saw "no need for comment at this time".
He also worries about American democracy.
The former Montenegrin official spoke in an interview with "Al Jazeera" about the socio-political situation in the United States, assessing that the new-old president of that country Donald tramp the first head of state there to "leave so much political space to big capital", and that "some eminent players of American big capital have shown greater ambition than to reorganize America itself".
"So their ambitions extend to Europe. It seems to me that we should all be very cautious about this new circumstance. It seems to me that the warnings that say the American value system is in danger are realistic. That American big business is threatening to eat up American democracy," he said.
Of the political actors, only the leader of the ruling Democratic People's Party reacted to Đukanović's messages. Milan Knezevic, saying that this “attack on the State Department and American democracy is equal to Al Qaeda's attack on the Twin Towers in 2001”.
Lekić: First he attacked Montenegrins and some minorities, then Serbs
Lekić assesses that Đukanović incited divisions in Montenegro on two occasions by producing enemies. Once, he says, “as a great Serb, anathematizing and politically disqualifying Montenegrins and parts of minority peoples,” and the second time when “as a (quasi) Montenegrin he attacked the Serbs in Montenegro with harsh anathemas, who became the main evil of the state of Montenegro.”
"To avoid confusion regarding the term 'quasi-Montenegrin' - I am referring to groups that are primarily characterized by two constitutive elements: aggressive hatred of Serbs and belonging to a financial-clientelistic network of a certain background that is linked to Đukanović. This, predominantly interest group, should be distinguished from Montenegrins, a historically more established people who do not hate others and who are ready to cooperate with everyone, especially in Montenegro, and to defend Montenegro and its interests in the style of authentic historical tradition."
Lekić says that in Montenegro and the Balkans, unlike the USA where different groups are integrated into a “compact American nation”, the opposite is happening - that a relatively strong connection through a common destiny has been transformed into “divided ethnic fiefdoms”. This process, he warns, is taking place in Montenegro with a population of 620 thousand, and, he claims, has progressed dramatically, “with an unknown and risky outcome”.
"Đukanović does not see his role in this. Look at the Americans now. Personally, I can have critical assessments of American operations in the world, including their geopolitical adventures after the end of the Cold War, but transferring their philosophy of ethnic divisions is too much, in any case - unsustainable. Pointless, even if it came from one of their problematic clients, whose alliance they may not have made much of a name for themselves. In any case, I would leave it to them to discuss this phase of the relationship."
Perović: More signs that he is scared
Perović says that it is obvious that Đukanović is scared, although in the interview with “Al Džaziri” he claims that he feels safe. According to her, this is shown by his arrival to the position of honorary president of the DPS (which should happen next week), frequent interviews “in which he cries over the fate of the state”, the participation of his family in student protests initiated due to the recent massacre in Cetinje...
"But this primarily shows the way in which the DPS has been acting since the retirement of the Constitutional Court judge (Dragana Đuranović). The dramatization of the Constitutional Court case by the DPS, which is desperately trying, under the banner of defending the Constitution, to return this court to its previous state, that is, to a blockade with half of its party judges, reeks of panic and dangerous intentions. This, of course, does not abrogate the responsibility of the government that continued to fill that court with political bargaining, and that interpreted the laws according to its own interests."
The opposition led by the DPS claims that the Constitution has been violated because the parliament, without the mandatory notification of the Constitutional Court, decided in mid-December last year to declare the termination of Dragana Đuranović's judicial function in that court, due to her reaching the conditions for retirement. They demanded that things be returned to "the previous state", saying that, otherwise, they would not allow the highest legislative chamber to work.
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