A healthcare worker carries Covid-19 vaccine boxes from Sinopharm Group Co. Ltd. at a vaccination site at the Belgrade Exhibition Center on 19 January.
Photographer: Oliver Bunic / Bloomberg
Photographer: Oliver Bunic / Bloomberg
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic puts his country’s status as a leader in continental Europe when it comes to getting vaccines in people – looking both east and west.
The Balkan country may seem like an unlikely success story, as the neighboring European Union is embroiled in a failure over vaccinations. Still, Serbia’s history of balancing its geopolitical interests is bearing fruit at a critical time.
Serbia has been an important bridge to China is in Europe, while the country is also a traditional ally of Russia and aspires to join the EU. These relationships have allowed him to diversify vaccine sources and inoculate a a larger proportion of its population than any other European nation after the United Kingdom Serbia injected 6.8% of its 7 million people, more than double the ratio in the EU.
Most of the 1.1 million doses imported by the government in Belgrade so far come from Sinopharm, backed by the state of China. Vucic says his refusal to join a chorus of leaders criticizing China at a security conference in Germany helped him establish good relations with Foreign Minister Wang Yi.
Aleksandar Vucic meets with Chen Bo and members of China’s team of medical experts in Belgrade on May 1, 2020.
Photographer: Shi Zhongyu / Xinhua / Getty Images
“I was the only one who didn’t accuse China of anything, so we had a fraternal meeting, the Foreign Minister and I, and since then our Chinese support for the coronavirus and the whole rest, “Vucic said on a television address to the nation last week.
The rapid implementation of injections to combat Covid-19 in relation to the EU underscores the tension across the continent and also the possible geopolitical consequences in its more volatile region. The Serbian approach already has its followers in the EU: neighboring Hungary he became the first member of the bloc to approve shots fired by Russia and China.
Serbia’s goal is to join the EU, although with an electorate already divided on membership, the pandemic risks pushing the country into the orbit of rival powers. Belgrade, meanwhile, has promised vaccine donations to Kosovo and Bosnia and Herzegovina, again exposing the divisions of the former Yugoslavia that fueled the bloody wars of the 1990s.
Read more: Vaccines are becoming geopolitical in the most volatile region in Europe
The EU has pledged to give six potential members of the Western Balkans (including Serbia) 70 million euros ($ 85 million) to buy shots from Covid, but deliveries are delayed. Instead of waiting for EU help, Belgrade got the vaccine directly from China, Russia and the US.
French President Emmanuel Macron acknowledged the problems Europe is having with the deployment of vaccine programs ahead of a luncheon with Vucic in Paris on Monday. “I wish France and Europe had been more present by your side on the issue of vaccines,” Macron told Vucic and a group of journalists. “Europeans need to be even more efficient at this.”
The first winners in Europe
Serbia is only tracking the UK to vaccinate its people
Source: Bloomberg
Former Slobodan Milosevic’s former information minister Vucic asked for favors when the Covid-19 crisis began, securing fans and protective equipment in the early stages of the infection. He then ordered vaccines from three suppliers: Sinopharm, Gamaleya of Russia and Pfizer-BioNTech.
Details about Chinese and Russian vaccines are less transparent than Western ones, although Serbian health authorities have tried to assure citizens that all shots in use are safe and effective.
A week ago, Vucic said he met with the Chinese ambassador and “literally begged her” for more deliveries. “Knowing President Xi, I think before May or June we will receive significant quantities of new vaccines from China.” Serbia is also now looking to start local production of the Russian vaccine.
The Serbian leader controls the government and has strengthened power in the 2020 elections with one a resounding victory, amid the boycott of some opposition parties accusing him of autocracy. Its release to voters, however, includes its ability to establish relationships across the geopolitical spectrum, regardless of the feathers that could sink in the way.
In June, Vucic condemned pro-EU politicians for kissing the Chinese flag when a plane delivered medical supplies from Beijing to Belgrade. At the time, he described the EU’s pledge of solidarity, by far the main contributor to aid and investment in Serbia, as “a fairy tale on paper”.
The Sinopharm Group Co. Ltd. vaccine was handed over at Belgrade’s Nikola Tesla Airport on 16 January.
Photographer: Oliver Bunic / Bloomberg
Providing vaccines to Serbia gives China a major geopolitical victory, as it faces a less fragile and more Sino-skeptical West under U.S. President Joe Biden. In recent years, China has focused on infrastructure investment in the Balkans through its Belt and Road Initiative, including a rail connection between Belgrade and Budapest in Hungary.
There is a perception that China is more prepared to help than the EU, he said Faris Kocan, foreign policy researcher at the University of Ljubljana. “It started with mask diplomacy and the story continues with vaccines, even though the Balkan nations are strategically dependent on the EU,” he said.
On January 19, Serbia has contracts for 6.5 million vaccines for health workers outside the vaccination booths at the Belgrade trade fair.
Photographer: Oliver Bunic / Bloomberg
Serbia began vaccination on December 24, days before the EU. He has contracts for 6.5 million vaccines, but the global uproar over the nuisances is undermining confidence that the offers will be met, Vucic said. No vaccine has been produced through the multinational Covax initiative, which was soon joined by the Balkan state.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has remained Monday’s crisis talks with pharmaceutical executives and European Commission officials as part of efforts to speed up stuttering vaccination. According to Bloomberg, the 27 EU states have collectively inoculated 2.9% of the population compared to 14.7% in the UK and 10% in the US. Vaccine follower.
“People in the EU are good people, but luckily they had enough experience and knowledge to assume it would turn out that way,” Vucic said. “This is a war for people’s lives, but also for the future of all countries.”
– With the assistance of Ania Nussbaum, Peter Martin, Andrew Langley and Jan Bratanic