Vučić: We will not join the EU either this year, or the next, or the year after that, but that is our strategic path

"We have nowhere else to go and we are not going anywhere else. That's why - pragmatically, rationally, what is it that we can do for them, what is it that they can do for us, what is it that is good for our citizens"

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Photo: Reuters
Photo: Reuters
Disclaimer: The translations are mostly done through AI translator and might not be 100% accurate.

Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić said tonight that he does not expect Serbia to join the European Union in the next few years, but that this is the country's strategic path.

"Will we enter the EU tomorrow? Let me tell you, I am not a fraud and a liar to tell our people, like everyone else. Whoever comes to us, he tells them that the day after tomorrow we will become members (of the EU). Well, that's nonsense. Of course, we will not become members of the EU the day after tomorrow. We will not be a member of the EU either this year, or next year, or the year after," Vučić told reporters in Belgrade, after a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron.

He added that even the EU is not "crazy and enthusiastic" about Serbia, nor that the citizens of Serbia "do not jump to the sky when they hear the EU" as they used to, but that regardless of everything, this remains Serbia's strategic path.

"We have nowhere else to go and we are not going anywhere else. That's why - pragmatically, rationally, what is it that we can do for them, what is it that they can do for us, what is it that is good for our citizens. Thank you to the president Macron for always understanding that," said Vučić.

He added that France supported Serbia in many ways, and that he was grateful to Macron and French diplomats for that.

"In many situations, France understood Serbia's position, which is not easy and not simple, and it is not always easy and simple to understand, because it is different," added the President of Serbia.

According to him, Macron supported and was one of the initiators of opening a new cluster in Serbia in European integration.

Vučić also said that he did not know which cluster was in question, the third or the fourth, adding that "he is not interested in those bureaucratic matters", but that he is interested in the issues he discussed with Macron this evening - the issue of green corridors, a single payment area , the PEM convention and solving problems that "can bring something to the citizens of Serbia".

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