BELGRADE, October 21. /TASS/. Serbia won’t impose sanctions on Russia unless there’s a threat to its citizens and the existence of the country, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on Thursday.
"We aspire to Europe, this is indisputable. I didn't say we'd never do that (impose sanctions on Russia - TASS). I repeat every time that as long as there is no threat to the existence of Serbia, its citizens, we will continue to adhere to our independent policy and the policy that we adopted at the meeting of the National Security Council," he told the Prva television channel in an interview.
The Serbian leader said that "as soon as there is an existential threat" to the country, he will appeal to citizens and explain the situation regarding sanctions.
Earlier, Vucic said, in comments on an annual report of the European Commission on Serbia, that the European Union believes that the country will make progress toward joining the EU by condemning Russia every day, and the country is regressing in that sense.
Vucic warned the world faces a lengthy conflict, crises and changes of governments.
"We are facing long-term conflict, terrible crises, changes of government, terrible instability everywhere. The Ukrainians are getting the most modern and advanced weapons - except for hypersonic ones: Russia dominates there, while the rest is dominated by the West - and this will bring us to a long-term conflict, until someone understands, and someone should understand this, that it’s necessary to hold talks. But until then, until someone agrees to sit down at the negotiating table, a lot of time will elapse. We will have all the problems in the world up to this point," he told the Prva television channel in an interview.
The Serbian leader said that he doesn’t want to solve the problems of Ukraine. "Let them be decided by those who created them," Vucic said.
Earlier, the Serbian leader warned that Europe wouldn’t survive the crisis in Ukraine if Russia's special operation lasted for another year. Countries, he said, would face power outages due to the global energy crisis. Vucic has told the parliament Europe faced the most economically and politically challenging winter in Europe since 1945. On May 18, he said following talks with EU leaders that he expected the situation in Europe to deteriorate sharply this coming winter. He said he thought the situation would be worse than it had been during the World War II.