- Title: SERBIA-RUSSIA/PUTIN PARADE Putin attends Belgrade liberation parade
- Date: 16th October 2014
- Summary: BELGRADE, SERBIA (OCTOBER 16, 2014) (REUTERS) RUSSIAN PRESIDENT VLADIMIR PUTIN AND SERBIAN PRESIDENT TOMISLAV NIKOLIC ARRIVE FOR PARADE BANNER READING (Russian) ''VLADIMIR SAVES SERBIA' PUTIN AND NIKOLIC ON STAGE
- Embargoed: 31st October 2014 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Serbia
- Country: Serbia
- Topics: General
- Reuters ID: LVA8ORJOU665Z00OHRFCP0R2FI6A
- Story Text: Serbia feted Russia's Vladimir Putin with troops, tanks and fighter-jets on Thursday (October 26) to mark seven decades since the Red Army liberated Belgrade, balancing its ambitions of European integration with enduring reverence for a big-power ally deeply at odds with the West.
The display of military pomp, at a moment when the West says Russian troops are making war in Ukraine, laid bare the balancing act that Serbia - a candidate for membership of the European Union - has been forced into by a crisis recalling the Cold War.
It demonstrated, too, Russia's influence in the Balkans, which like much of Eastern Europe is dependent on Russian gas.
Before thousands of onlookers, more than 3,000 soldiers marched in Belgrade's first military parade since 1985, when it was the capital of socialist Yugoslavia. Tanks rumbled behind them and jets tore through the rainy skies above.
Putin looked on, having received Serbia's highest state decoration, the Order of the Republic of Serbia.
Nazi-occupied Belgrade fell to the Red Army and Yugoslav partisans on Oct. 20, 1944, but the parade was held on Thursday, Oct. 16, to accommodate Putin, on his way to Milan for an EU-Asia summit set to be dominated by Ukraine and fears of a new European gas crisis.
Serbia, which began negotiations this year on joining the 28-nation EU, has refused to join the Western sanctions imposed on Russia for its backing of pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine, despite EU pressure to align its foreign policy. Belgrade still has time, however, with EU accession unlikely before 2020 at the earliest.
While Serbia pursues EU membership, Russia's United Nations veto remains the only thing standing in the way of Serbia's former Kosovo province joining the world body - a red line for Belgrade six years after the majority-Albanian territory declared independence with the support of the West.
Putin's visit is popular with many Serbian voters, for whom fellow Orthodox Christian Russia is still Serbia's protector.
For Putin, the parade will play well at home, while the Russian economy is taking a hit from Western sanctions.
The Russian leader brought with him a promise of $1 billion in investment in Serbia's oil monopoly, majority Gazprom-owned NIS, and a call for Serbian exporters to make the most of new opportunities on the Russian market after Moscow banned Western food imports in a retaliatory step.
The EU has cautioned the Serbian government on the need for solidarity, at least, and not to stimulate exports to Russia.
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