Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic. Archival photoBELGRADE, Mar 24 Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić on Radio and Television Vojvodina called shameful and stupid Western accusations against Russia in connection with the operation in Ukraine, noting that 19 NATO countries were bombing Serbia in 1999. The authorities of Serbia on March 24 mark the tragic anniversary of the start of the NATO bombing of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
"You cannot return human lives: 16 employees of Radio and Television of Serbia, the lives of 82 children, civilian victims, our military and police who did not commit aggression against any country. Now, after 23 years, you can see how terrible, wrong, illegal and, above all, extremely immoral this operation of 19 NATO countries was. How shameful it is today and, pardon the word, it sounds stupid that they attacked Serbia because of an alleged humanitarian catastrophe", the President of Serbia said.
“As they said, we are preventing a new Auschwitz, and this was said by the then German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer, and there were also “collateral losses” and senseless lies that they created. Therefore, it is so stupid when they blame Russia today because of the aggression against Ukraine, and someone will remind them that they did the same thing and even worse,” Vučić pointed out. According to him, small nations are “always victims.” “When you talk about the big ones, then their morals, principles and values, which they constantly talk about, do not exist at all. If they existed, the question would arise — why don’t bomb those who are bigger, who did you much worse than we are small , but they don't want to, because the big ones can answer,» the Serbian leader noted.Vucic reproached the West for electoral morality towards Serbia and UkraineIn an address to citizens on March 2, President Vucic said that the Serbian authorities supported four of the 13 points of the UN resolution condemning Russia's actions in Ukraine — those that do not involve sanctions and do not plan to alienate property Russian companies in the country. According to him, the crisis due to hostilities in Ukraine is having a dramatic impact on Serbia, which has come under enormous foreign political pressure. at that time consisting of Serbia and Montenegro, by NATO forces. The military operation was undertaken without the approval of the UN Security Council and based on the assertion of Western countries that the authorities of the FRY carried out ethnic cleansing in the Kosovo autonomy and provoked a humanitarian catastrophe there. Air strikes by the North Atlantic Alliance continued from March 24 to June 10, 1999 and led to the death of more than 2.5 thousand people, including 87 children, and $100 billion in damage. Russia launched a military operation in Ukraine on February 24. President Vladimir Putin called its goal «the protection of people who have been subjected to bullying and genocide by the Kiev regime for eight years.» For this, according to him, it is planned to carry out «demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine», to bring to justice all war criminals responsible for «bloody crimes against civilians» in Donbass. According to the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, the Armed Forces strike only at the military infrastructure and Ukrainian troops. With the support of the Russian Armed Forces, the DPR and LPR groups are developing an offensive, but there is no talk of the occupation of Ukraine, the Russian president emphasized. hysteria, said the head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Serbia