Aleksandar Đenic | New Communist Party of Yugoslavia (Serbia)
Dear Comrades,
In this year, as we commemorate 80 years since the victory over fascism, we are simultaneously confronted with the consequences of counterrevolutionary processes in Eastern Europe, as well as the aggressive policies of Western imperialism against all progressive, sovereign, and socialist countries around the world. The decommunization process in Eastern Europe has led to the disintegration of socialist states and the loss of their sovereignty. This policy has spawned invented traditions and a rewriting of history—a widespread inversion in which victims are turned into oppressors, freedom fighters into criminals, and criminals into heroes.
The Serbian people, alongside other Yugoslav nations and under the leadership of the communists, led the largest anti-fascist resistance movement in occupied Europe. This historical experience teaches us that even an underground party of only 7,000 members was able to recognize the dialectical moment and rally the masses. Unfortunately, during the counterrevolutionary upheavals and the destruction of socialist Yugoslavia by Western imperialism, our country—at the behest of the European Union—embarked on a path of decommunization during its accession process to the prison of nations, the EU, where the rich grow richer and the poor become even poorer. In this context, Serbia has not been spared from the fate of historical revisionism, much like the other Eastern European countries already in or seeking EU membership.
Nevertheless, despite the anti-popular nature of Serbia’s current government and its policy of EU integration, Western imperialist pressure continues unabated, because Serbia has not been fully subdued—Serbia remains outside of both the EU and NATO and retains more sovereignty than many other European nations. As a result, under Western dictate, a military alliance has been formed between Croatia, Albania, and the occupied part of Serbian territory—the false state of Kosovo. It is clear that this alliance is directed against Serbia. Pressure is mounting on Serbia for not imposing sanctions on Russia, and the Serbian president is under EU scrutiny for deciding to attend the Victory Day celebration in Moscow on May 9th.
In Serbia today, protests are being steered by the liberal opposition, which criticizes the current government not for its subservience to Brussels, but for not being even more submissive in enforcing anti-popular neoliberal policies dictated by the EU. Though there is genuine dissatisfaction among the people, it has been misdirected in the past six months, ultimately leading to the fall of the Serbian government. The new so-called “expert” government has continued the same anti-popular path, and under EU pressure, individuals labeled as pro-Russian have been excluded from ministerial positions.
The anti-popular course of the current regime is perhaps best illustrated by its intention to gift the General Staff building—a state-protected structure bombed during NATO’s aggression—to Jared Kushner, son-in-law of Donald Trump. Furthermore, the government plans to hand over land in Western Serbia to the British-Australian company Rio Tinto for lithium extraction, with a 4% royalty over 99 years, effectively turning Serbia into a mining colony of the EU. Lithium is, of course, a strategic mineral in the EU’s competition with China over electric vehicle production. These are just two acute examples of the government’s servile policy toward Western imperialism.
Another major threat from this government is the ongoing rebranding of the United States in Serbian media. A dangerous campaign is being promoted that portrays Donald Trump as an anti-establishment figure and a defender of Serbian interests—even though he imposed 37% tariffs on Serbian goods and maintained the same foreign policy toward Serbia as all prior U.S. administrations.
Our party also faces intense anti-communist propaganda—not only from regime media but from the highest levels of government, including the president himself. In one regime-run television broadcast, our comrade Vukašin Žuni큓, a member of our youth organization’s secretariat, was publicly targeted with vicious lies about him and our organization.
Yet, the task before all progressive forces in our country is to conduct a principled and determined anti-imperialist struggle. We must campaign relentlessly against NATO and the European Union. Furthermore, all progressive forces in the Balkans must unite in opposition to NATO’s war-mongering policies and push for its expulsion from the region. The Balkans cannot be free while NATO remains. A NATO-free Balkans would give our peoples the chance to voluntarily unite, to develop together—because only through alliances can small nations, divided and pitted against each other by NATO, protect themselves. Small, quarrelsome nations are easy prey, and NATO thrives on those conflicts to justify its presence. For that reason, we repeat once more: the Balkans must belong to the Balkan peoples—NATO must leave!
In this spirit, the duty of all progressive forces in the Balkans and worldwide is to build a united front against Western imperialism. Today, as contradictions emerge within the imperialist system itself, we must seize the moment to assert our political line. We must be conscious of the specific conditions in each country and adapt our tactics accordingly—but our strategy must remain clear: unwavering support for all anti-imperialist forces engaged in struggle against Western imperialism!