Edward Joseph, a professor and expert on Balkan affairs, has said that lasting stability in the region is impossible as long as Serbia is allowed to benefit from the European Union while maintaining close ties with Russia and China.
Joseph criticized the administration of former US President Joe Biden for its approach to Belgrade, arguing that Washington missed a major opportunity to put pressure on Serbia following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
According to Joseph, Western policy toward Serbia has been driven by fears that pressuring Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić could push him closer to Russia and China.
“Serbia can never afford this. […] Serbia can never become the Belarus of the Balkans. It cannot. That is not an option,” Joseph said.
He described Vučić’s policy as a false balancing act through which Serbia benefits from European funding while simultaneously maintaining close relations with Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Joseph stressed that stability in the Balkans cannot be achieved while Serbia continues to pursue what he described as an undemocratic and revisionist course.
“There will be no stability in the Balkans when the largest country is fundamentally undemocratic, with an undemocratic, revisionist orientation. It will not happen,” he stated.
According to Joseph, the West’s continued accommodation of Belgrade has failed to deliver stability. As an example, he cited the armed attack in Banjska, northern Kosovo, in September 2023.
He argued that the Biden administration’s strategic mistake was failing to pressure Serbia when Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine a moment when, in his view, the West had an opportunity to demand that Belgrade make a clearer choice regarding its political and security alignment.
“You have to choose,” was the message Joseph believes the United States should have delivered to Serbia at the time.
Joseph also argued that Kosovo’s membership in NATO could reshape the region’s strategic dynamics, end security uncertainty and compel Serbia to make a clearer choice about its orientation toward the West.
He emphasized that achieving this would require American leadership and a new approach to the Balkans one that, in his view, must include a clearer policy toward Serbia and support for the region’s Euro-Atlantic integration.
