Serbia is trying to do in the Balkans the same thing that Russia is doing in its region, said Montenegrin President Milo Djukanovic who was a guest of the United States Institute of Peace.

The Russian aggression against Ukraine strongly affects the Western Balkans region, while Russia’s most drastic impact on the Balkans was in 2016, during the parliamentary elections in Montenegro, said Djukanovic, reported the CDM portal.

The Montenegrin President said that, at the time, Russia tried to topple the Montenegrin Government in a coup d’état and to stop Montenegro from joining NATO, but Montenegro managed to stand up to it.

Djukanovic said that the Balkans are witnessing an attempt to create a “Serbian world” modeled on the “Russian world.”

Russia is trying to revise the history of the countries in its region in order to secure the dominance and influence that the Soviet Union once had, and Serbia is trying to do the same in its region, said Djukanovic.

He stressed that these are retrograde politics that are not looking to run their countries, but their nations.

Serbia is trying to rule and to have a say in Montenegro, in Bosnia and Herzegovina, in Kosovo and in North Macedonia, yet there is still no adequate reaction of the partners in the West to such politics.

Commenting on the Montenegrin presidential vote and Russia’s potential influence on it, Djukanovic said he would like to be able to say that Russia is not interfering, but added that would be “just an illusion.”

The Russian world is the same as the Serbian world. Russian politics in their region are the same as Serbia’s politics in our region, and their most important instrument are the Orthodox churches. At present day, both the Serbian and the Russian church are political organizations, said Djukanovic.

He added he regrets that all his “timely warnings since 2016 were not met by a more adequate reaction of some Western addresses.”