China's growing influence in Europe - Serbia and the New Silk Road

China is increasingly active in Europe. Serbia has a particularly close relationship with China: Since 2010, the Chinese have invested some $8.5 billion there. But who are the people who keep things running on the ground? When it comes to implementing China’s giant "New Silk Road" project, Serbia came in second place worldwide in 2022. But the story is complex: While Chinese companies are buying up the eastern part of the country around the Bor copper mine and extracting raw materials there on a large scale, second-generation Chinese in Serbia are beginning to realize their dreams.

Kosovo: Dozens injured in clashes between ethnic Serbs and NATO soldiers | DW News

 

Dozens of people have been injured in northern Kosovo, where police and NATO-led peacekeepers have clashed with ethnic Serbs - the majority in the country's north. Serbs have been trying to block ethnic Albanian officials from entering municipal buildings. The officials were appointed after last month’s local elections, which were boycotted by Serbs and had a turnout of less than 3.5 percent. Demonstrations desceneded into chaos on Monday, with US condemning protesters violence and international calls for de-escalation.

Inside the country backing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine - BBC Newsnight visits Serbia

 

As the first anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine approaches, the majority of people in almost every European country are opposed to the war... with one notable exception. Serbia has long been an ally of Russia, with close political and economic links.

How fragile is the peace between Serbs and Kosovars?

 After weeks of protests, ethnic Serbs in Kosovo have agreed to take down the barricades amidst hopes of tensions easing.

Kosovo’s uneasy peace has again come under threat – this time from protests by ethnic Serbs that lasted weeks.

A single incident – the detention of a former Kosovo Serb police officer – ended up drawing in the United States, the European Union and Serbia to defuse a dangerous standoff.

'For the long haul': In Serbia, Russians who fled Putin prepare for life in exile

Just as it had done more than a century ago, when thousands of Russians fled the Bolshevik revolution, Serbia has again become a haven for those fleeing repression, uncertainty and the real possibility of being drafted to fight in a war they don't consider their own. According to the country's state media, more than 100,000 Russian citizens have arrived in the country since Moscow's invasion of Ukraine in February. They’re using one of the few remaining flight routes into Europe following mass bans across the continent.

 

Lavrov cancels Serbia visit: Russia's FM blasts "unprecedented" airspace closures • FRANCE 24

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on June 6 described as "unprecedented" a move by three eastern European countries to block his plane from travelling to Serbia, adding that he had yet to receive an explanation for their decision.

Sergei Lavrov: "This was a deprivation of a sovereign state of the right to carry out foreign policy"

Isn't that what Russia did when it invaded the Ukraine? Violated their sovereign rights.

#MeToo​ Serbia: 'I thought I was the only one' - BBC News

 

A #MeToo​ movement has been sweeping through western Balkans after Serbian actress Milena Radulovic went public with allegations of abuse against a former drama teacher.

Holiday Inn Sarajevo: In the Eye of the Siege

How international journalists found themselves in the centre of a bloody conflict they were determined to cover.

Originally opened as a glitzy VIP accommodation for the 1984 Winter Olympics, the Holiday Inn was the ground zero of the siege of Sarajevo in the 1990s and became a fortress for the world's media covering the conflict.

On April 5, 1992, a peaceful march for Bosnian unity turned into violence which people think of as the official start of the siege of Sarajevo. The conflict lasted nearly four years and took the lives of thousands of Bosnian Muslims, Serbs and Croats.

Marchers were protesting against a worsening rift between the three main nationalist parties sharing power in Bosnia-Herzegovina - the Muslim SDA, the Serb SDS and a branch of the Croatian HDZ.

Kosovo: Murder in Mitrovica

What does the killing of a Kosovo Serb politician reveal about the deep fault lines running through the Balkan state?

Two decades ago, the small Balkan state of Kosovo was fighting to secede from neighbouring Serbia, which was resisting the final break-up of the former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

After NATO intervened on the side of Kosovo's majority ethnic Albanian population, the separatists won and a decade later in 2008 declared full independence.

This has since been recognised by a majority of nations in the world, but not Serbia, which still claims sovereignty over the state

Chasing Mladic: The Hunt for the 'Butcher of Bosnia'

People and Power examines the story behind the hunt for Ratko Mladic, Europe's most wanted man.

Ratko Mladic, Europe's most wanted man, was arrested in the small Serbian village of Lazarevo in May 2011.

He had been on the run since 1995 when he was indicted by the UN war crimes tribunal.

Mladic led the Bosnian Serb army through Europe's bloodiest conflict since World War II. Together with political leader Radovan Karadzic the two men became synonymous with ethnic cleansing, the forcing of Bosnia's Muslims and Croats from their homes.