186. President Aleksandar Vučić: Russia, China, and How Serbia Could Join the EU

24:32You know better than I do. Did he think he was going to win? Did I think? Did he think? I believe that he trusted in his pollsters in a way, although he was saying to me that it was neck to neck. But two days after, it was not an easy conversation between two of us because it was emotional one. And we were speaking. It was a relatively long telephone conversation, open line. But he said to me, whatever you were saying to me, you were right. And there was something else. As a lousy chess player, I was always more prudent and more cautious and less optimistic than he was. This is my nature. I'm always more prudent and more cautious.

25:19That's why I'm avoiding any kind of clashes, even with the small guys. is even it's take care of your things, of your job, then go somewhere else.

25:28Rory Stewart:Mr. President, we are more, as you know, on the Kamala Harris side of politics. But maybe you can explain to us, what is it do you think that liberals like us don't understand about what Viktor Orban was trying to say or what Donald Trump is trying to do? What is the case for the more right-wing style of politics? I'll be very honest. I cannot justify every single move of Donald Trump. But if you ask me whether I do understand American people that voted for Donald Trump, yes. Tell us about it. If I were American, would have voted for Donald Trump. And you are now in a country where he used to have by far the highest level of popularity in an entire world apart from the United, no, much bigger than in the United States.

26:14It was 74, 75 % of popularity. Now it's lower. Now it's lower. but many other world leaders. And why do they like him? What do they like about him? And about that politics that he and Orban represent? First of all, people in Serbia, as I told you, they hate Clinton administration because of 1999 and 2008. Democrats. These are historical reasons. Then people here are more conservative. If you see my two older kids, my son and my daughter, they're totally different. one would always belong as a conservative, as a religious guy to Trump people. My daughter, although she's not lesbian, she supports all LGBT rights, all these alleged real liberal values and everything else.

27:08But people in Serbia are mainly conservative, traditional people, many of them religious people, not only Orthodox people, but Muslim people. Do you think Trump is religious? No, but he was speaking about family values. He was speaking something against transgender or whatever else. And people here like that. These were the main reasons at the end. They expected to get, people were jubilant to see changes in the United States to find a friend in Washington after so many years. And they were cravingly trying to find a sufficient reason to say, okay, it's not America that we are fighting against.

27:56It was that administration. We have nothing against American people, United States of America. We love that country. And this was the reason why Trump got such a huge popularity here.

28:10Rory Stewart:Maybe to come back to this, I mean, we feel strongly that because of what America is now demonstrating to the world, trying to take Greenland, this operation in Iran. Like you try to get Kosovo together with them. We didn't try to take Kosovo as our territory. The United States was trying to take Greenland as their territory. They tried to annex the territory. But you tried to do it eight years after. After you, as Alistair said, won the war. We're not trying to annex territory to our own country. Not to your country, but to separate it from the other countries. That's a slightly separate question, right?

28:43Rory Stewart:No, no, I think… Listen, we should come back and do a whole series about Kosovo. To us, it's pretty much the same. Okay, so you see… So do you defend Trump on Greenland? No, I'm not. You think the United States taking Greenland is correct? I'm not even defending violation of international public law on Iran. Although I believe that I'm a big friend of Israel. I believe so. The only flag that was hoisted here in front of this presidency, apart from Serbian flags, and once European Union flag was Jewish flag. I cannot justify absolutely everything, but whether I'm still a friend of Israel, yes, I am.

29:20But you also recognize a Palestinian state. Yes, but also I cannot say that it's not a violation of international public law when you start attacking a sovereign country like Iran.

29:31Rory Stewart:To develop this, we assume that… We have principles, unlike you, Alistair, from time to time. As the world reconfigures, our instinct is that the future of European countries is a deeper integration with Europe and the European Union. Yes. As opposed to the United States. We cannot rely on the United States in the way that we have for the last 70 years. I believe that we reached the point of no return. What I believe that Americans will do in the future, this is my guess. and they are smart and diligent people, as you know. And they will try to build their structures in Europe. Now, Trump reasonably will try to escape from further conflicts in Iran.

30:14That will end one important era, but will bring us to a very complicated and very complex relationship all over the world. And I believe that the United States and their politicians, it doesn't matter. You're going to see that. It's not going to be totally changed, even when Democrats come to power, if they come to power, because there are still two and a half years. But what I believe that will happen, I believe that America will build its own structure, taking five to ten countries in Europe, mainly in East Europe, under not their control but with the predominant influence of the United States of America, creating any issues for the European Union.

31:07And that's why I don't understand the European Union, why those guys did not bring so far strategic decisions based even on that letter that was signed by Eddie Rama and myself. I don't get it, to tell you the truth, because all the other decisions were political in the past. And we were not asking for veto right. We were not asking for commissioners. We were not asking even for bigger fundings.

31:31Rory Stewart:Nothing. So, Mr. President, to summarize, your idea is that by pushing ahead with Serbia, Albania, and presumably others, joining the single market. All the others, yes. Joining the single market. Because without all the others, it has no sense. And you're bringing, I don't know, Montenegro and Moldova to Europe without Serbia. What's the sense? Yeah, bring them all into the single market. And one of the reasons strategically to do this is that if it doesn't happen, it provides an opportunity for the US to try to pull off the Eastern European countries away from the Western European countries.

32:02Yes, not only some countries here, but if I were them, would have done the same. Smart people would have done it. And then they can speak to one structure in Poland. They are deeply divided. Another structure in Romania. Another structure in Bulgaria. It's not that easy for Europeans to keep control if Americans would like to make it differently. Do you think one of the worries in Europe, in the European Union, is that what you and Eddie put forward was a way of saying we can get in without doing all the things that Europe is asking us to do? No. You don't think that's their suspicion? No. I don't want to be rude.

32:48I am arrogant and impudent from time to time, as you know, dear Alistair and dear Rory, but I don't think so. when it was 2004, I believe, when Romania and Bulgaria joined the European Union. Were they fulfilling all requirements, all demands, even today? It's not the case. Do you think any of the big powers in Europe actually want enlargement to continue? If they don't, they're making a big strategic mistake. But do you think they do want it to continue? I hope so. I hope that there are some understandings. for the first time after many years in Italy, France, and Germany. That's what I believe, but I'm not sure about it.

33:36President Vujic, Rory, quick break, back for more.

33:42Hi, everybody. It's Dominic Samaric here from The Rest is History. Now, some of you may have heard me on your show, The Rest is Politics, when Rory was away and I was filling in and enjoying Alistair Campbell's tremendous banter. And I'm back to tell you about our new series on The Rest Is History, which is all about Britain in the 1970s, a period with a lot of uncanny resemblances to our own. So right now we're living through a moment when oil shocks generated by war in the Middle East are rippling through the world economy, when Britain feels like it's sunk in a bit of a malaise, people are arguing about Europe.

34:19The government has got a few issues with the trade unions. And we have a kind of, I suppose you'd say governing elite, a kind of political class that is really struggling to come to terms with all of these issues. And people are asking if Britain is governable at all. So there are a lot of parallels between that Britain that I'm describing, which is our Britain, and the Britain of the mid-1970s. So in this series that's coming out on The Rest is History, we'll be looking at these and other issues. We'll be talking about the rise of Margaret Thatcher, obviously a colossal figure in our political life even now, whether you love her or loathe her.

34:54We'll be talking about the very first Brexit referendum of 1975, a subject that I'm sure Rory and Alistair will have strong opinions about. We'll be talking about the fall of the Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson. And we'll be talking about one of the grimmest moments in Britain's economic history, the moment in 1976 when we had to go cap in hand, as people said at the time, to the International Monetary Fund, the IMF, for a then record bailout. Now, if that sounds good to you, how could it not sound good to you? Of course, it sounds good to you. We have a clip for you to listen to at the end of this episode.

35:31And if you want to hear more, just search for The Rest is History wherever you get your podcasts.

35:41Rory Stewart:Help us understand your position in relation to Russia. How should Europe think about Russia? How should the United States think about Russia? What is the strategic vision for the West? You were always presenting yourself as a beacon of democracy. Russia was a beacon of evil. And that's it, you know, which is not true. Explain. Which is not true. There are nuances. There are many gray nuances. It's not everything that is black and white. But put that aside. Right. What I was saying to everybody - But broadly speaking, we are more democratic than Russia, right? Okay. I mean, the gray and nuances, but Putin is running an autocratic state.

36:23There are different cultures. There are different traditions. There are different worlds at the end. Russia is not a part of European Union. At least you used to be a part of European Union, but you were not satisfied and you left, as you know, and you are still fostering us to go there. And we listen to you and we are on that path.

36:41Rory Stewart:We would also like to rejoin the European Union. We will join. We can be part of your project. Yeah, but it's late to remorse on something that you have already done. Anyway, you were always speaking about Serbia. That was a Russian puppet. We've never said that. Okay. Never said that. And also, I would argue, as it was interesting, in my introduction, I pointed out, you've actually provided a lot of munitions to Ukraine, but for some reason you don't want to talk about it. No, I did not. I was doing my job selling our ammunition to different countries because we need to earn money and we need to feed our workers.

37:22And then we discussed that with Russians. They attacked me face to face. They said to me this and that. And I said to them what I thought and what I had to say. And I said it in a very open, transparent and sincere way. I'm praising you for what you did. I'm not going to discuss it. No, no, I'm not going to discuss it because what was said on a closed meetings, I'm not going to expose it. But I had an answer for them. But let me tell you this. You didn't see that as backing Ukraine? No, we were backing all humanitarian efforts in Ukraine. We were sending money. We were sending humanitarian support and everything else.

38:01Armament and ordnance, we didn't sell to anybody, to any of war infections. This is our official stance and that's it. But speaking about… So the Americans aren't a warring faction? No. We had long-term agreements with Americans for 25 years. Okay. Prvipartisan, you know, they were selling ammunition for 25 years to the United States of America. For 25 years, let's say. But we were selling, let's say, to some African countries that were re-exporting that to Ukraine. We were selling to – Russians were very angry because we sold many things to Bulgaria, then to Bosnia and Herzegovina. And I was – but that was my decision to sell it to Bosnia and Herzegovina.

38:48That's why we've never said you're Putin's puppet. What Rory's trying to find out is what your relationship is. What I was always – our relationship is we are traditional friends. We have good relationship with them. But we are a sovereign nation. And we are an independent country. and we are Serbs. We are not small Russians. We are not small Ukrainians. We are just Serbs. Will you go to the May 9th ceremony this year? I haven't decided yet, but I was there last year. And just let me tell you this, dear Rory. And people were always exaggerating about it, about Russia's influence, everything. Okay, we have good relationship.

39:33They can always give me a call. I can give them a call, and I believe that's helpful always. But the real issue is, when I became the prime minister, Russia was partner number two. Italy was number one. Bosnia and Herzegovina was number three. Now, economic partner number one by far is Germany. Number two is China. Russia is number 11. Serbia has changed. It's not about political approaches. It's about economy. It's about economy. It's about reindustrialization of the country. It's about a country that progressed so much that now we have more than 2 billion of trade exchange with Poland, Czech Republic, Slovak Republic, Hungary, Romania, and all those in a way surrounding EU countries, which is a big, big, big change.

40:27It has never been the case before. China.

40:30Rory Stewart:Where do you think strategically Europe, Serbia should position itself in relation to China? How should we think about the Chinese relationship in the next five years, ten years? China is, I know that you're listening to Lik Chang's speech from 2015 or 2016 in Munich conference. He was saying, in a relatively naive way but very smart way, He was saying, you know, China just wants to renew and to revive something that was regular to become number one power of the world. And then Angela Merkel replied to that saying, who told you so, that it was a regular situation? And she got a big applause. But China showed itself as a very serious state, a very responsible state on a world political stage, a country that brings stability.

41:26And that country, they're so successful, they're overtaking everybody, including the United States of America. Even combining softwares and hardwares, they're ahead. AI and softwares, they're neck to neck with Americans. whether you're going to buy Chinese hybrid or electric vehicle or European. Most of the people just in five years in Europe will pick Chinese hybrid and electric vehicles. I get the feeling, watching some of the things you've said about China and the number of times you've visited China, that you've got a huge admiration. I'm a big admirer of their businesses. Yes, and I don't hide it.

42:04They are a dictatorship, okay. Put that to one side. They have a different system. You cannot impose your values and your thoughts to everybody else in the world. I'm not trying to do that. No, you have to observe. You have to respect someone else's customs, tradition. I can do that. I was making a different point. I was going to say, put that to one side. I'm not going to put that on that side. Don't mention it. Okay, put it in. What is it that they do that you admire so much? I'll tell you. I admire their diligence, their devotion. I admire something they have. And we lost. We, Europeans, we lost.

42:50It's an eye of a tiger. They're cravingly trying to overtake United States of America. We are lagging behind. Take the best European car companies. They are at least, we know that. People, ordinary people, they don't know it because they cannot find that information in any of our papers. We are lagging behind Chinese on technological level regarding hybrid machines, not combustion engine. Three to four years, at least. And you believe that we are going to close that gap in years to come? No. The gap will become bigger because they have an eye of a tiger. they are ready to work not only 8 hours but 10 or 12 hours they have long term targets long term aims what we do how does it look our working day we work for 2 or 3 hours everything else belong to digital laziness and complaining against our bosses against so we've lost our will to win do you think it would be good if China did overtake the United States I cannot discuss that I'm not that smart I'm just saying what I see today.

43:59I'm not a prophet, not a visionary person. But what I'm doing, like in chess, like in sports, I can put pieces together. I can analyze the situation. You definitely made an early big bet on China, that's for sure. And it helps a lot a bit. I know you don't like taking these compliments. Let me ask you this. Your constitution, you can only serve two terms and you're heading to the 10th year of your presidency. And your papers were saying that I was going… Stop going about my papers. I don't even read our papers. I still understand a bit of English. Yes. Yeah. That's how I read it. And what do they say?

44:38Yes. They were saying tens of times that Vucic was preparing himself and preparing the ground for changing the constitution because he'll never leave this presidential palace. I'm not saying that. I haven't read those. Okay, let me ask the question. The question is whether you might do a Putin-Medvedev situation where you go back to being prime minister again, somebody like Anna Barnavich becomes the president, and you stay part of the scene. You're still very young. You're a lot younger than I am. It's not about someone's age. I still have more energy and bigger enthusiasm than most of my opponents, and even most of people that are surrounding me.

45:28But I'll be very honest with you. Now we are doing polls. All the polls, all different surveys, all focus groups, all crisis groups, everything, in order to see whether there are other candidates able to beat the candidates that are coming from the opposition. Other people, both people other than you? Yes. For President and Prime Minister? I cannot candidate myself for the president. No, no, so the prime minister. Because I'm not going to violate our constitutional regulations. I'm now scrutinizing possibility for candidating someone else on parliamentarian list in order to be the new prime minister.

46:09We'll see whether there is possibility to secure our legacy in that way or not. If there isn't, would you stand? I'll do that. But the problem that I have today is that, and I cannot hide it, and it's not fair to my people. If I won't be able to find that energy, I say to my people, not fit for the job. because you know what I passed in last 14 years? You know how difficult that was for you in not an easy time, a bit smaller period of time. And you just put yourself into my shoes in last 12, 13, 14 months. What I passed through, it's something that no other leaders have been going through. You're talking about Novi Sad, you're talking about...

47:03Yeah, I'm talking about everything. I'm talking about all the attempts to overthrow me, mainly finance from outside. Also, it was partly genuine, no doubt. But you're still the most powerful person in Serbia by a mile. And the most popular. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, but... This is back to the difference between you and Orbán, that you're just looking on the dark side. Maybe you're right, but the real issue is that I want to see Vucic from with the same level of energy which I had in 2017, 2019 even 2020 but you're more than 20 years younger than Donald Trump I think you do I'm almost 10 years younger than that young candidate of the students you know, so what?

47:51I'm telling you it's not about someone's ages if I will feel fit, then I might go, if not I'll be very honest and very sincere with my people. Because at the end, all the other guys from the opposition would be jubilants, would be jubilant just not to see my name on the list.

48:12Rory Stewart:My final question, let's say you remain in politics, you become prime minister, or you remain in French. What is your vision that you would drive through in terms of Europe? And what is your vision in terms of what you would drive through inside Serbia? And in particular, what is the long-term post-Vucic vision? What is the kind of democracy that you imagine Serbia becoming? You asked me a question that goes in depth of our society. I'll tell you something else before that. I believe that spending a few hours in Belgrade, you were able, dear Alistair, to see a totally different city. From the last time I was here?

48:54Yes. Yeah, definitely. Totally different city. Absolutely everything has changed. We changed the face of this country. Everything's different. This country is 61 % of overall Western Balkan FDI attraction. This country is 50 % of overall Western Balkan's GDP. This country is 55 % of overall Western Balkan's export. This country, when I became the Prime Minister, used to have public debt to GDP ratio 79%. Today is 41%, just for you to know. Every salary used to be 329 euros. Today is 1 ,057. I believe significant change. We built more highways, more motorways, than it was built in the last 60 years.

49:45This will remain my legacy. What I believe, speaking about structural reforms, democracy, Europe, I think that we can become a part of Europe in a way that we proposed. Everything else European countries will never agree upon. And this is the only rational and I believe the only possible way being a part of Europe, which we want to be. If you ask me whether I would like to be a full-fledged member state, yeah. But that is not going to happen that easy because of all these preterms that we have. Yeah, yeah. Uncosedly. Already discussed. Yes. Yeah. Let us do this. Let us do this. And then, at the end, even if I become the Prime Minister, even if I go for that, which is not certain yet, otherwise would have already announced that, even if it happens, that would be my last tenure.

50:46I will say that in advance, like Angela Merkel used to say that. Because you have to understand that people become fed up with you. It doesn't matter whether you did something wrong or not. Nobody cares about it. They're fed up with you. They just want to change something in their life. They're fed up with the same face staring at that for 14 years. Yeah, and you're on the TV a lot. It's part of your job. It's not criticism. No, no, no. But, you know, I was thinking about it thousands of times. And Eddie Rama is always making a joke about it. He prefers social networks. now Vucic has to refer to his Serbian citizens he didn't do it twice today he now needs to do it and that's it but if I was not doing that then you would say you're an arrogant bastard that didn't want to show any kind of care for his own people you don't explain anything to your people you don't justify your position your stances and everything else it's always easy to criticize and to spit on someone if that was not done that way you would criticize it from the other side now listen, Susanna's giving me the evil eye and you've got to go in and visit my very final question, we normally talk a lot about, with our guests about their childhood and their upbringing, how serious a football hooligan were you?

52:10I was a big football fan yeah, I'm a big football fan I was partly a football hooligan you know, partly a hooligan were you also? I was arrested in different parts of home. I was never arrested. I was watching football when there was a lot of violence around football, so it was impossible not to get involved in it. But you went looking for it. And you got arrested many times. Yes. You're more of a hooligan than him. Yeah, much more. Much more. A bit. Much more. Yes. But, you know. Is football still as political here as it ever was? Is it still as political? We are passionate people. We are ardent people here.

52:46We have two big teams. or Red Star and Partizan, as you know. And it's a big rivalry like United and even bigger. Celtic Rangers. Like Liverpool Everton or Celtic Rangers. Celtic Rangers. Burnley Blackburn, I think, is probably the best. Burnley Blackburn. Burnley Blackburn, yes. He's serious. He knows. He's serious. He knows. Of course, I know. It was like Litz Millwall before, you know. Did you know he's a big Burnley fan? Huge. He knows a lot about me. Anyways, lovely to see you again. It's good to see you always. and please come more often to Serbia. Okay. Thank you very much indeed. Thank you very much.

53:21Thank you. Thank you for your time. Thanks a lot. Thank you. Bye-bye.

53:26So, Rory, we've met President Vucic, me for the, I don't know how many time. And me for the first time. And what do you make of it?

53:33Rory Stewart:Well, it's extraordinary. I mean, first thing I think to explain to the viewers and listeners is we're in the presidential palace, which is, of course, much, much grander than Downing Street. It's so much grander than Downing Street. And we walked past all those glass cabinets, which were full of what? They were full of mainly weapons that had been given to him by other leaders, swords, and there were a couple of guns from Vladimir Putin. Quite interesting. So the Russians are great ones for giving semi-automatic weapons, 19th century rifles, cutlasses. But interestingly, the Azerbaijanis, the Czechs give little handguns.

54:05Rory Stewart:There's a lot of that stuff. There's some beautiful icons down there. Beautiful icons as well. So a long sense of martial history, Serbian Orthodox history. Yeah. And we're in the library with a table, which is a chessboard, because he is actually... A very serious chess player. Well, people say he's a very, very good chess player. He was saying he was very average, but... Yeah. Well, what he actually said is that he won the Belgrade parish level and never quite made it to the master's level. So it'd be interesting to play Rachel Reeves, who's a very serious chess player. Listen, I think more seriously, he is a figure who's very popular with some Serbs and very, very unpopular with other Serbs.

54:37Rory Stewart:So when people are listening, I hope they will feel that we gave him opportunities to talk, that it was a generous interview. There will be service from the opposition who will be very angry. They will feel that we should have been much tougher on authoritarianism, on all the allegations around the judiciary, the media. And of course, if you are our friend Alvin Corti listening, you'll be very cross that we didn't challenge more strongly on Kosovo. How do you think about this question of what happens when you interview somebody who's a genuinely controversial figure with a very, very difficult past?

55:11Well, put it this way, all political leaders have some people who love them and some people who hate them. He is, as I said at the end, by some distance, the most popular politician in Serbia. My hunch is for all that, you know, I think genuine sort of - He's basically saying he's going to run to be prime minister. I think so. I think he's going to run to be prime minister. And that means that he stays basically very, very powerful. Because of course, as I understand the Serbian constitution, The prime minister used to be the most powerful position in the country when he had it. He's become the president.

55:40I wonder if it won't go back. You're right that some people maybe think we didn't push him hard enough and this and that. But what he's very, very good at, we could have spent the whole 50 minutes, whatever it was, just revisiting arguments that we had during the Kosovo War. And I think a lot of our listeners and viewers would have got very fed up. He's not going to give ground on that. I'm not going to give ground in terms of us thinking that it was legal. We were doing the right thing. but that's that is for the past i thought i i he was much more aggressive on europe than i thought he would be i i wondered whether part of the reason for him wanting to do the interview or agreeing to do the interview was actually to say you know i'm going to be a bit nicer about europe but no he was very you know we've given you an idea it's a good idea if you don't take it you're

56:24Rory Stewart:making the big mistake in a way we need to develop it more because for those of us who believe certainly you and I do, that Europe now needs to be the other corner of the global square. This whole question of how you get these countries, which are right in the heart of Europe, which are a sort of hole in the donut of Europe now, Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia, Kosovo, et cetera, into the European Union is completely vital. And so he's come up with this very interesting proposal, which I think I'm fully in favor of, which is let's push for a single market solution. And that will give them access to the European markets, free movement of people, no borders.

57:00Rory Stewart:So what he was describing was essentially something that felt a little bit like the Good Friday Agreement in relation to Kosovo. Once the border disappears, as he points out, the Kosovo-Albanian population can very much feel there in Kosovo. The Serbian population, North Mitribez in northern Kosovo can feel that part of Serbia, but it doesn't matter. Not a border, right? And the fact that he did it with Elirama, of the Prime Minister of Albania was... But the big disagreement, I guess, in that is presumably with Marta Kos and others in the European Union who actually imagine it the other way around.

57:29Rory Stewart:They would rather have full European Union membership and then catch up on the conditions rather than single market membership delaying the EU membership. Although when I went to Ukraine with Marta Kos, I got the feeling that she does feel something has to give. But she feels to get the member states to allow something to give, she has to have more sense of a buy-in for the processes. And she was clear with that with Zelensky as well. But listen, I think what he was saying as well about, you know, I guess if you take out all our spat over Kosovo, what he was talking about there, I think, is a small country, small, medium-sized country like Serbia, working out its place in the world at a time of monumental geopolitical change.

58:16And he was basically saying, America's always going to be important, but we've got our doubts. He was saying, Russia, you guys have got a very, very narrow lens through which you look. We're trying to broaden that lens. And he was basically saying about China, if you don't recognize that this is where the future is coming from, you're in trouble. You know, it's at least the vision of your place in the world.

58:33Rory Stewart:Yeah. And actually, it's a very interesting vision because certainly from the US point of view, they would be very uncomfortable with their talk about China. I mean, the one thing that most of the Democrats and Republicans agree on is that China is a threat and a peer competitor. The one thing that the British right agrees on, you see this in Boris Johnson's op-eds and things, that if you have to choose, you have to choose the US against China because China is seen as a dictatorial regime that's destroying the world. And he just wanted to push that to one side. Yeah. I also thought that even though it will irritate some people, I thought it was good actually to hear him give the nationalist narrative, remind people that this is actually genuinely what a nationalist politician in the Balkans thinks.

59:15Rory Stewart:And to speak positive about Orban, relatively positive about Russia, challenging ideas of liberal democracy, challenging liberal interventions. Was he speaking to you in a conservative? No, I mean, I didn't think he was speaking to me in a conservative, but I think it's It's really useful whenever we feel we're in a bubble to be reminded that there is a whole world out there of people who he was relatively gently actually explaining have a completely radically different worldview that we maybe don't give enough space to. I had an irony though that on his desk, he had the place of Alexander Popovich, which I thought was an extraordinary thing to do.

59:55Rory Stewart:Alexander Popovich is basically, you could argue, is a sort of satirist of the current Serbian regime. He actually writes about the communist period, but he's writing about wily politicians who changed their political views. He writes about bureaucrats, propagandists, use the language. He's basically a satirist of, you could argue, of the contemporary political scene. And yet it was sitting on his desk. I don't know whether he reads Alexander Popovich, but it would be a bit like, I don't know, Nigel Farage having George Orwell on his desk. It's a very sort of discordant thing. Is he doing it ironically?

1:00:29Rory Stewart:Is he doing it without being conscious of the criticisms? Might it be, Rory, that this is a room that they use for interviews and they've just put a few books on the desk? I don't know. But it was interesting at the end. You wouldn't let me ask him about it. No, you can apologize if you want. But I'd rather talk about China and Russia than the books on his desk. Interesting though it is. But it was interesting at the end after we'd stopped filming when he started then to give his a long reading list about books about Serbian history and Serbian literature that we should read. Which again is very striking.

1:01:02Rory Stewart:It's something that the British basically suffer from historical amnesia. We have no real memory of what happened in 1997, let alone in 1897. I remember 1997. Whereas Serbia, you know, really does want to think about what the British did in relation to the Ottomans in the mid-19th century, which really doesn't feature an article. But I'm always, it's not that I'm impressed by meeting politicians who read lots of books, but I'm always unimpressed by politicians who don't. I think that, you know, I know how busy politics is, but if you don't broaden your mind by reading, particularly about history, politics, then I think you're missing a big trick.

1:01:37Rory Stewart:Now, the biggest thing that you achieve, for which congratulations, is that at the end, he said that he would agree to do an interview with the two of us and Albin Kurti. Which would be, I think, would be only their second. Would be unbelievable. So let's try to make that happen. We'd definitely try to. If Albin Korti is listening or his people are listening, we said at the end, listen, this Kosovo thing, you've got to at least make an effort. We've talked to Albin Korti on the podcast. We found him fairly reasonable. Why can't we come back and get the two of you together? And he said, I'd be happy with that.

1:02:08So Albin, if you're listening, let's try it. And let's try and disagree agreeably. Do you think we disagreed agreeably on Kosovo? Was that okay? Yeah, yeah, we did agreeably. He got a bit snarky.

1:02:18Rory Stewart:I mean, listen, there's a whole series of bits of background, which probably is worth explaining. So he is essentially saying that Britain in particular, you know, David Cameron did a lot of this, British intelligence did a lot of this, was saying that Serbia was trying to destabilize Melbourne Kosovo. And he said it didn't happen. Actually, there were some very disturbing movements around police stations, weapons, paramilitaries. It's a very tense, difficult situation. But he is correct. So far, peace is held. And we've got to lean into the optimistic reading. And the optimistic reading would be that he's been on a huge journey.

1:02:51Rory Stewart:He's changed his political positions a number of times. And if we can push it in a pro-European position, that would be great. Final one for me there. He had this very interesting narrative that we've heard less about, which was the sort of implicit threat to Europe, which is, if you don't push ahead with enlargement, Eastern Europe will start playing footsie with the more right-wing version of the United States. So the idea would be the Law and Justice Party in Poland. Or Russia. The more populists. But particularly, he said the US are really going to be able to play with the populace in Romania, Bulgaria.

1:03:23That is part of the US strategy. The reason they were so invested in Orban's election, I don't know whether they'll do the same here, but Bulgaria as well. Germany, France, I mean, it's obvious. The UK, it's kind of obvious what they're trying to do. Anyway, look, I thought it was really interesting. I think a lot of, I think you're right, some people would have expected us to sort of want to just come and beat him up. I think that was pretty pointless. I thought he made some really interesting observations about the state of the world and Serbia's place within it, which ultimately is kind of his job.

1:03:54Rory Stewart:Yeah. And interesting, I always feel when we interview presidents of Serbia, Kosovo, Greece, Cyprus, even Spain, how actually much more confident they are speaking about the geopolitical frame in the world order than somebody like Keir Starmer. Now, that may be that a smaller country feels freer to think big thoughts. Or it may be that just you can't get through a whole episode without actually criticizing Keir Starmer. It might be that too. It might be that too, yeah. Without doing my famous impression of Keir Starmer. Yeah, don't do it again. Don't do it again. Oh, you can if you want, but...

1:04:24Rory Stewart:But anyway, thank you very much. See you soon. Take care. Bye-bye.

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