IRMO Brief 09/2022, Russia Instrumentalizes the Western Balkans and Can Set it Ablaze at Any Time

Since the beginning of the Russian aggression against Ukraine, the Serbian media have been pursuing two goals: to support the Russian position and to portray the West, in the shape of the United States and the European Union, in a very negative light. According to this reading, NATO has forced Russia to launch a “defensive war” to oppose the allegedly aggressive Western military alliance and to save its own national identity. Russia is thus portrayed as a victim identical to the victimization of its own country in the NATO bombing in 1999. This narrative is not only prevalent in Serbia, but can be found in a weakened form in other territories of former Yugoslavia: In Bosnia-Herzegovina, Montenegro or in northern Kosovo.

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