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In Serbia, the arrest and beating of Nikola Sandulović, an opposition politician critical of President Aleksandar Vučić and Serbian policies on Kosovo, are creating a major political case with still quite unclear contours. The arrest was claimed by the former head of Serbian intelligence in circumstances yet to be understood: it is not clear why Sandulović was arrested, nor whether and in what way there is a direct involvement of Vučić himself, an eventuality which, in addition to further aggravating the tensions which have been present for some time between Serbia and Kosovo would give the case a whole other dimension, due to the possible use of violent methods of repression of dissent by a formally democratic government close to the European Union.
Sandulović is 61 years old and the leader of the Serbian Republican Party: it is a small opposition party, rather marginal and without seats in parliament, which made the arrest of its leader even more unprecedented and the dimension it is acquiring not only in Serbia but also on the press international. The Prime Minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti, also spoke out, accusing the Serbian government of managing dissent in an authoritarian manner and effectively comparing Vučić to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
This unspeakable brutality represents the toll the Serbian govt imposes on its own citizens for daring to acknowledge the truth & pursue reconciliation. It also constitutes a serious breach of the ECHR & a Putin-like assault on those who refuse to participate in genocide denial.
— Albin Kurti (@albinkurti) January 5, 2024
Vučić is a member of the center-right Serbian Progressive Party and is a fundamental figure in the country’s politics: in recent years he has managed to enormously consolidate the control exercised by his party over politics, the media and Serbian society. Sandulović has long been known in Serbia for his criticism of Vučić, often expressed in flamboyant and provocative ways, as well as for his positions in favor of Kosovo, a former Serbian province with which deep-rooted and violent tensions have been ongoing for decades ethnic and territorial.
In 2014, at the beginning of his political career, Sandulović broke off a presentation by Vučić at the London School of Economics, in London, accusing him of electoral fraud. On many other occasions he has expressed himself in favor of Serbian membership of NATO, the military alliance of which a series of Western countries are part, with Atlanticist positions that are in fact very far from those of Vučić, who is instead close to Russia and Putin . On other occasions Sandulović has said he is a supporter of the former US president Donald Trump. The Serbian government also accused him of being part of a group considered criminal, il gruppo Zvezdarskaaccusation that he always has rejected.
In recent months, Sandulović’s positions in favor of Kosovo had materialized in a series of rather provocative public gestures. Last August, for example, he met the leader of the Republican Party of Kosovo Faton Kurti in Pristina, the capital of Kosovo. On that occasion he had signed, with a public ceremony, a formal declaration of mutual recognition between Serbia and Kosovo as sovereign and independent states (the Serbian government does not recognize Kosovo as such) and of a joint commitment to join both NATO and European Union.
Declaration on mutual recognition of Serbia and Kosovo, joint entry into @NATO and the @EUsigned on March 13, 2023 in Pristina by of the Republicans of Serbia and the Republicans of Kosovo Mr. #FatonKurti.
WHO DOESN’T WANT THIS?@StateDept @SenatorMenendez@GOP @WhiteHouse pic.twitter.com/Oudwg82c9Y— Nikola Sandulovic (@Sandulovic_N) August 15, 2023
Sandulović was arrested on January 3, just after another public stance in favor of Kosovo: the day before he had shared a video on X (Twitter) showing him placing a wreath of flowers on the grave of Adem Jashari. Jashari was one of the founders of the Kosovo Liberation Army, a Kosovar-Albanian paramilitary organization considered terrorist by the United Nations, which supported the Kosovar Albanian rebels who fought a war against the Serbian-controlled Yugoslav army between 1998 and 1999. The war ended after the intervention of NATO, which bombed Serbia in response to the ethnic cleansing and widespread human rights violations committed by the Serbs against the Kosovar Albanians.
It is not clear when exactly the video published by Sandulović was filmed: last year during his visit to Kosovo or more recently. Sharing it, however, Sandulović declared that he was “the only Serbian politician who came to pay homage to the innocent Albanian victims” and that he had “apologised and asked for forgiveness on behalf of the Serbs”.
I am the only politician from Serbia who came to pay his respects to the innocent Albanian victims, the Jašari family, at Prekazi. I apologized and asked for forgiveness on behalf of the Serbs who did not commit this.@CNN@albinkurti @aliciakearns @federicawoelk @VjosaOsmaniPRKS pic.twitter.com/Czl0pcJ8cR
— Nikola Sandulovic (@Sandulovic_N) January 2, 2024
On January 3, the day after the video was shared, Sandulović was taken by a group of men while he was in his home and returned to his family shortly afterwards, in very poor physical condition, with numerous bruises on his face and body circulated online in a series of videos. Sandulović’s family suffered accused the Bezbednosno-informativna agencija (BIA), the Serbian national intelligence agency, of both the arrest and the beating.
#Serbia 🇷🇸
The protest against the legislative elections, considered fraudulent (vote buying), continues. One of the opposition leaders, Nikola Sandulovic, was arrested and then beaten by the security services. pic.twitter.com/ELeUPa91cX
— World Maps (@CartesDuMonde) January 5, 2024
Various hypotheses were immediately made regarding the reasons for Sandulović’s arrest. One of these was that it was linked to the accusations that the opposition is making against Vučić over alleged irregularities in the last elections, which took place in December and were won by the centre-right. These accusations have been at the center of violent protests and other opposition politicians for weeks they said they had suffered intimidation da parte di Vucic.
– Read also: The center-right has won the parliamentary elections in Serbia
On Monday 8 January Aleksandr Vulin, who was head of the BIA until two months ago, he publicly claimed the arrest, without commenting on the beating: he told the Serbian broadcaster Novosti that the opposition leader was arrested «on my orders, which remained in force even after my resignation, because he was suspected of undermining the constitutional order and of actively working to support the secession of the so-called Kosovo».
The day after Sandulović was released arrested again and accused of inciting national, racial and religious hatred, a crime that in Serbia can lead to five years in prison. He is currently in a military facility in Belgrade, the capital of Serbia.
It is unclear how it could be possible that Vulin, formally without any role in the BIA for two months, could have actually ordered Sandulović’s arrest. Interviewed by German wavethe Serbian politician and Sandulović’s lawyer Cedomir Stojković he said he believes that Vulin is lying and that he is taking responsibility for the arrest on behalf of Vučić himself, with whom he also agreed on his resignation. At the moment, however, no other elements have emerged to substantiate these accusations.
For now the European institutions are maintaining cautious positions: Peter Stano, spokesperson for the European Commission, he said that he is in contact with the Serbian government but that at the moment “it is important to have full clarity on what happened”, without adding anything else. The public stance of Kosovar Prime Minister Kurti also signals how the Sandulović case has already contributed to exacerbating tensions between Serbia and Kosovo, which caused several violent episodes in 2023.
Meanwhile, on Wednesday 10 January Sandulović’s family visited him in the facility where he is staying in Belgrade, for the first time since his second arrest. His daughter, Karla, said he was left partially paralyzed after being beaten in detention. The British newspaper Guardian he quoted a statement she made to the legal organization Justice Abroad: «He is able to communicate, but is completely paralyzed on the right side; he is in a wheelchair and his health conditions are very precarious.”