People pass under Serbian and Russian flags put because of pre-elections of Serbian parties for snap Kosovo parliament elections in the northern part of ethnically divided town of Mitrovica, Kosovo, 10 June 2017. Photo: EPA/Djordje Savic

Serbia’s latest National Security Strategy lists separatism, extremism, recognition of Kosovo’s independence and attempts to revise Bosnia’s 1995 Dayton Agreement as some of the main security threats to the country.

The strategy, published on the website of the Defence Ministry, says the status of Kosovo, inter-ethnic tensions and the migrant crisis are having the most impact on the country and the region.

“Separatist tendencies in the region are a real threat to security,” it says, placing particular emphasis on “the problem of unlawfully unilaterally declared territorial independence … of Kosovo and Metohija”, as Serbia refers to its former province, which declared independence in 2008.

The strategy complained of Kosovo’s “non-implementation of the Brussels Agreement, the slow establishment of democratic standards in Kosovo and Metohija, disregard for the basic human rights of the Serbs and other non-Albanian populations, the usurpation and destruction of their property and cultural and historical heritage, and radical Islamism”.

On Bosnia, the document also warns against attempts to revise the 1995 Dayton Agreement that ended the 1992-5 war there, which it said “have a negative impact on stability and security in the region”.

Naming no names, it added that in “some countries of the region, there is a tendency, as well as attempts, to achieve a high a degree of the national unification of the ethnic space and implement ‘greater states’ projects, which would include revisions to and changes to internationally established state borders”.

The strategy says Serbia’s progress in its EU accession process is positively affecting the country’s political, economic and social stability, but that Belgrade must also continue to build bridges with key powers such as the US, China and others.

“To further develop the region’s democracy, stability and prosperity, it is important for … Serbia to improve relations with the United States, the Russian Federation, the People’s Republic of China, as well as with other traditional partners and significant factors,” the document reads.

It warns that the “intelligence activity of foreign entities toward political, economic and security factors in the Republic of Serbia, among other things through subversive propaganda activities, attempts to destabilize institutions and provoke tensions in society”.

The document is the policy paper with the highest strategic value in the field for the Belgrade authorities. Its implementation is designed to protect national values and interests of the state from challenges, risks and threats to security.

Public discussion on the draft is ongoing until 15 May, with public events involving representatives of state bodies and experts.

However, at one such event, some experts raised concerns about the strategy and its use. “I absolutely do not think that stability can be built in this way,” assistant Political Science professor Goran Tepsic told a discussion on May 8, N1 television reported.

Serbia’s Minister for EU integration, Jadranka Joksimovic, said in March that the strategy had been given to President Aleksandar Vucic to read and that, after he gives his opinion, and the public debate ends, the final word on it will go to the country’s MPs.

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