President Aleksandar Vučić’s claim that the Military Security Agency (VBA) discovered an “illegal recording” of his conversation with Dijana Hrka the mother of a victim of the Novi Sad tragedy has opened yet another chapter in Serbia’s deepening crisis of institutional credibility.
While Vučić presented the discovery as proof of surveillance against him, the story has raised more serious concerns: Why was the VBA, a military intelligence body, monitoring the president’s communications in the first place — and why was Vučić so quick to make it public?
Security experts and former officials warn that the case exposes how the country’s intelligence services have become extensions of the ruling Serbian Progressive Party (SNS). Instead of safeguarding national security, the VBA now appears to function as a political instrument — monitoring activists, silencing critics, and staging loyalty operations around Vučić’s image.
Former army officer Novica Antić described the agency as “a secret police working for the regime,” noting that it routinely acts outside the law and that its top positions are filled by political loyalists rather than professionals.
Analyst Nikola Lunić questioned why the president revealed internal intelligence information publicly, calling it “a breach of institutional protocol meant to serve political theater.”
Even former VBA director Momir Stojanović admitted that the agency has “long exceeded its authority,” a process that accelerated under Vučić’s rule.
This latest “scandal” seems less about an illegal recording and more about the decay of Serbia’s state institutions. In a system where security agencies operate as party tools, legality becomes a matter of convenience — and Vučić’s word, not the law, defines the truth.
