The crisis with Serbia’s Oil Industry (NIS) showed how strongly Serbia depends on Russia and how hard it is for the country to choose clearly between Moscow and the European Union. Now, as Europe draws clearer lines of values, a key question grows in Serbia: is it time to choose the side that leads toward a more democratic and secure future?
The current crisis with the Oil Industry of Serbia (NIS) has exposed all the weaknesses that Serbia has in relations to Russia and shattered any illusions about why Serbia has been refusing, for years, to impose sanctions on Russia due to its aggression against Ukraine. At the same time, it has opened up the possibility for pro-European actors in Serbia to finally, at a time when more clear value lines are being established on the European continent, choose the “good side” and make up for the deficit.
Dušan Spasojević, associate professor at the Faculty of Political Sciences, University of Belgrade, reminds that Serbia reduced itself to this problem because of the US sanctions on Russia, and now it has to react in some way, although so far, by balancing between several factors in foreign policy, it has been avoiding pressure for not imposing sanctions on Russia.
“The fact that the government is not reacting is telling us two things – first, how affraid the government is of Moscow and second, how determined the government is to never do anything, not to choose a side, but rather to lead us into a crisis instead of aligning themselves, at least to some extent, in the current conflict,” Spasojević pointed out.
The President of the Republic of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, has publicly admitted that Serbia is dependent on Russia, not only in terms of energy, and that his government has been working to its own detriment and in the interests of Russia for the past 13 years. He specified that Serbia has done everything to ensure that the Russian investor is not facing “any trouble”.
He also admitted that Serbia has had the preferential right to purchase NIS four times so far, but has not used it, and has even given the Russians an additional 50 days to resolve the problem with NIS.
Spasojević sais that Aleksandar Vučić “should not be trusted with anything”, especially in this situation where many things are not clear even to the professional public, and that Vučić obviously wants a twist like in the case of Hungary.
“A peace agreement between Ukraine and Russia is being announced, and that’s what Vučić hopes for, so the situation could change. I think they are using the crisis around NIS to create drama and score positive points for themselves, and what will really happen, I think no one knows at this point,” Spasojević points out.
Neither the fact that Serbia has the most expensive fuel in the region, nor the fact that the South Stream gas pipeline, which was discussed during the sale of NIS, was not yet built, was enough for Vučić to cut across and finally put Serbia’s interests ahead of Russia’s.
BIA is not aware of what the “Russian brothers” are doing
The discovery of Russian paramilitary camps in Serbia, for which people close to the Minister Nenad Popović were arrested, in which foreign nationals were also trained to interfere in Moldovan elections, did not make President Vučić to address harsher words to Russia. Although he was proverbially well informed about what was being posted on the social media, he could not say whether Russian security services were behind those camps. He found that the camp had been discovered based on information from private individuals, and not on the basis of information from the Security Intelligence Agency (BIA) or the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
Source: pexels.com
This development of events surprised no one, especially if we recall that recently the head of the BIA, Aleksandar Vulin, holder of even two Russian decorations, officially confirmed the suspicion that the BIA is not dealing with real threats to the constitutional order of Serbia, but is an extended arm of the FSB that expels Russian anti-war activists and forwards to Putin reports on their activities in Serbia.
Negative EU report, the most critical so far
The condescension towards Russia is even more striking when we recall how Vučić used “undiplomatic vocabulary” to address members of the European Parliament, calling them “scum”, “European scumbags” and “pathological liars”.
Such behavior largely caused the European Commission’s most critical Report on Serbia’s progress in the EU accession process for 2025.
Among other things, in its assessment of Chapter 30 (External Relations), it notes that it is necessary for Serbia to “continue to intensify efforts to combat the circumvention of sanctions” towards Russia.
For Chapter 31 (Foreign, Security and Defence Policy), it is indicated that Serbia should, as a priority, “make additional efforts” to further align its foreign policy with the EU CFSP.
“As of 24 October 2025, compliance with the CFSP stood at 63% (compared to 59% in 2024), and has increased in recent weeks after Serbia retroactively aligned itself with several Council decisions and EU statements, including some decisions listing Russian nationals and statements condemning Russia’s actions.
“Serbia has not aligned itself with the EU’s restrictive measures against Russia, nor with a number of other EU statements and restrictive measures regarding Russia, China, Belarus, Iran, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, and the destabilization of the Republic of Moldova,” the report states.
Will Serbia even join the EU?
Dušan Spasojević recalls that Vučić publicly admitted that Serbia is able to allow the Russians much more than it would allow any foreign country.
“This does not mean that there are no other gestures or mechanisms by which the government flatters the West, such as selling weapons to Ukraine and the like, but it is clear that Vučić is now afraid to send any negative signal to Moscow, because he is already under pressure from the West for other things, and is now in an even worse situation,” he points out. Spasojević, however, does not believe that this will be enough for Serbia to completely abandon the European path.
“It is possible that something will happen, but a lot more needs to happen before we can say that something has fundamentally changed,” he believes.
The problem for Vučić and his pro-Russian electorate is the fact that Russia has not even considered sells its stake in the oil company to Serbia.
“Since he presents himself as a great friend of Russia and Moscow and that Putin appreciates and respects him, it is further difficult for him to explain this situation where Russia has a certain room for maneuver to help the citizens of Serbia, and to make an agreement that would return to this market at some point, but for some reason, Russia is avoiding it. So this is now a problem for the government, and it is also a bit of a problem for the Russian interests in Serbia, but I would stipulate that it is too early to say that this is a major change,” says our interlocutor.
He adds that the pro-European opposition and civil society could take advantage of this situation and make even clearer stance towards the EU, especially since students are avoiding this topic, as well as other foreign policy issues.
“It seems that we are truly living in times when some clearer value lines are being re-established on the European continent and it would be good for Serbia to choose the good side, the democratic side, and use this opportunity to catch up,” Spasojević pointed out.
