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Comment by illuminated | Hacker News Reader

The law was withdrawn after everyone noticed its contents: https://www.b92.net/eng/news/politics.php?yyyy=2021&mm=09&dd...

Edit: probably a better article to explain the withdrawal: https://www.b92.net/eng/news/politics.php?yyyy=2021&mm=09&dd...

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> All together, they can't collect 10 percent, and the law has been in a procedure... I didn't look at the law, not a single word. We\'ll see what the law will be in the future.

That's a direct quote from Vucic... wow. Might as well say, it's election season so I had nothing to do with this. Nothing else to see here people, move along.

He wants to be seen as a savior, just as all dictators do.

I know very little about Serbian politics, is this genuinely gone for good or will they just try to reintroduce it later or by other means?

More likely than not, the bill will sit in a drawer waiting for the perfect reason, or distraction, necessary to be pushed through.

I don't believe it will ever be forgotten. The PM in the article says he withdraws it as he's facing elections in 6 months, not for any other reason. He's got a strong support among the elderly and/or "conservatives" so it is expected for him to win those elections. Once he does win, I'm sure he'll try to reintroduce the same thing.

The capital of Serbia is being covered in surveillance cameras for some time now, a "gift" from Chinese friends, and I don't think they'd let the technology sit unused, especially that the overall unrest of his opposition is rising.

Small correction: the guy was the PM until 2017. now he's the president (but basically the Big Boss since 2012.)

You're right. I stopped tracking his formal roles (or caring in any capacity about them) since the time when the most prestigious position in the state was "the first vice-president of the government" (his, at the time) and the running joke was that everyone, including the PM and the president, were eyeing that position if they wanted to advance their career further.

It might come back but it will have to be another law. The current law prevents the executive branch from doing mass surveillance without a warrant.

They already installed more than a thousand (there is FIOA law in Serbia, but the official number is designated as state secret) Huawei cameras through Belgrade (a city of 2M), but they are (at least officially) not doing automatic biometric matching currently.

In general, the politics scene is completely broken - there is one (ruling) party that allegedly bribes/blackmails people that work in the public sector to vote for them.

You're never sure, it's always a drama and thriller with any kind of political decision with the current dictatorship, no matter how minute the decision is. Even though the government has backed off with the law, the explanation mentions "foreign powers preparing a blood bath in Belgrade using the law just as a reason for it, just because they don't want Serbia to prosper". The minister of internal affairs says that people give much more data when "they go to an embassy and squeal for a visa". It's always some mystical powers working against our benefit, good thing we have such a protective government...

As a Serb I have to say that the way our governmental officials speak for the local newspapers always feels like I am in the 4chan thread. Especially Vulin.

It sounds like my boomer parents trying to lay the guilt trip on thick.

>"...foreign powers preparing a blood bath in Belgrade using the law just as a reason for it, just because they don't want Serbia to prosper"

Is that an actual quote from an elected official in Serbia?

Really? The population of all of Serbia[0] is less than that of Hong Kong, less than that of London and less than that of New York.

The GDP of all of Serbia is also ~1/6 of Hong Kong, is less than 1/10 of London, and 1/30 of New York.

As such, my guess is that Serbia isn't very important to "foreign powers" at all. Certainly not enough for a "blood bath" or even harsh words. And certainly not as a result of proposed internal surveillance laws. Such a statement is ridiculous on its face.

Does the population of Serbia actually buy into that sort of rhetoric? I'm genuinely curious.

N.B. I don't have anything against Serbia or Serbs in particular. I know that historically there have been sectarian issues in the Balkans and the Serbs were caught up in that, but I'm pretty sure that like everyone else, most Serbs just want to have a decent life and raise their kids in relative safety and security.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Serbia

Edit: Added the missing link.

Pretty much. I didn't copy and paste the quote, but those are the words used.

You and I understand what you just wrote about GDP in relation to Hong Kong and London, but a vast majority of the population is severely limited in the way they consume information. Internet is widespread, but it is severely underutilized for any useful purpose, and the Serbian web scene is also flooded with pro-government portals. Also, a great deal of population (I can't say how much, but just empirically) has little exposure to any kind of western lifestyle, the only foreign countries they might visited would be Bulgaria or Greece on holidays. It's easy to convince people that life is good in Serbia. Especially because the government doesn't use Hong Kong or Austria to compare, but Croatia or Albania.

Wouldn't Serbia lag on every single indicator behind Croatia?

Yes, as carefully orchestrated by the Croatian government, who got its EU/Nato friends to make everything maximally hard for the Serbian people and economy.

Or, at least, that's how I assume the narrative goes?

At least younger generation doesn't seem to fall for that. Croatia is packed full with seasonal workers from Serbia.. and croatian workers left for other countries. Not ideal, but it is what it is.

If you're creative enough, you can always pull out an indicator, even artificial, to show progress. For example GDP increase during a period in absolute values. That doesn't make any sense without considering size/population of Serbia and Croatia and what's that in relative terms. Or the average salary in Serbia and Bulgaria. Yes, they're comparable, but key items are cheaper in Bulgaria, as well as taxes. The average salary in Sofia is also much higher then in Belgrade, and the lowest pension is higher than in Serbia. You get the picture, you can always dig up a metric and declare a glorious victory of our people led by our fearless leader.

Not to mention the government has some genuinely skilled professionals, beside sheer lunatics like Vulin, the minister of interior. By professionals I mean manipulators like the minister of finance. He's a skilled manipulator, even tied to Panama Papers, domestic violence, illegal demolition and a boat load of concealed wealth. If I had the need to produce some good quality smoke and mirrors, he would be the first guy I would call.

>Does the population of Serbia actually buy into that sort of rhetoric?

By and large, yes. Serbia has an aging population and especially older people (who constitute a large part of the current regime's voter base) are susceptible to this narrative of foreign powers trying to keep Serbia down. It's a tried and true authoritarian spin, persisting for decades in these areas. It doesn't help that historically, foreign powers were prone to aggressing against Serbia.

Younger people obviously don't fall for this (better informed, Internet-native), but they're more apathetic than anything. One cause for this is a lack of good alternative political options; the opposition is mainly people who've been in power before and were just not much better than what we have now.

If you could rally people behind an uncompromised, clean-slate political option you'd break the apathy, a critical mass of voters would emerge quickly and I believe Vucic and his cronies would fall in a heartbeat. But sadly nothing of the sort exists.

>> Does the population of Serbia actually buy into that sort of rhetoric?

> By and large, yes. Serbia has an aging population and especially older people

You mean those who remember Clinton bombing passenger trains to make up for the mistakes of US/NATO/EU in dealing with Bosnia?

It's not a stretch once you've been through that. Besides, a lot of people in the US still thinking Putin changed actual votes in the 2016 election. So, yeah, people are susceptible to this kind of stuff and it's not new.

It uses the old trick that good propaganda should have at least some truth to it. The reasons you listed are likely why it is finding fertile ground.

Considering large portions of Belgrade are still in ruins to this day due to NATO bombings, it's hard to escape the constant reminders of what "foreign powers" have already done to them.

What you just described is the biggest damage done by the '99 bombing. I dare to say larger than any material damage. That's the thing that pushed Serbs on the other side of the "west/east dichotomy" and any kind of marketing campaign will hardly paint Western countries as friends or allies. That's valuable ammunition put into hands of local populists. Not that some European leaders mind them ruling Serbia. Would you believe that there is a considerable number of people not willing to get vaccinated by Pfizer or Astra Zeneca Covid vaccines because "those people first bombed us, they're trying to poison us now"?

Yes.

I'd believe the same reaction in Afghanistan, too.

Probably not an apt comparison. Serbia actually is a unified state of sorts, Afghanistan is not and never really has been. How unified states and collections of tribes and warlords react to such things are quite different.

Not true. Pretty much the only thing that is in "ruin" is the old defense ministry building which is kept that way for the current governments propaganda purposes.

No I've been to Belgrade recently and there are no more bombing ruins to speak of. All of that was cleared years ago. In fact there's a lot of new construction happening in the waterfront area.

Ah, I stand corrected. Been a few years since I visited. At the time, everyone I met seemed to be feeling like a victim of the bombings and harboring some resentment at the west.

Many Serbians do still feel like victims and harbor some resentment at the west. But the 1999 NATO bombings were just one incident in a long litany of complaints (both real and imagined) going back centuries.

They also resent being used as a geopolitical pawn by Russia and China.

I can confirm there were some people who resented Americans/West when I went there. Luckily my Serbian coworkers would shut them up.

At least I wasn’t Turkish. They definitely resent 500 years of Turkish rule.

The younger generation is much more forward thinking.

Two world wars started there. Strategically its more valuable land than Israel.

Which is the second?

>As such, my guess is that Serbia isn't very important to "foreign powers" at all. Certainly not enough for a "blood bath" or even harsh words. And certainly not as a result of proposed internal surveillance laws. Such a statement is ridiculous on its face.

Most people who live in Serbia remember being bombed by the NATO...

>Most people who live in Serbia remember being bombed by the NATO...

That's as may be. And not something someone soon forgets.

But it doesn't obviate my point that "foreign powers" generally don't care what happens in Serbia.

They don't until they do, and when they do it is too late to do something about it.

It's rhetoric used back in Yugoslavia, and probably other dictatorships as well. It's always "foreign enemy" to keep the current agenda going. Serbia still has characters from ex-yu wars in high politics. It's sad actually. I hope Serbia gets rid of that and let people prosper.

That strategy has been used throughout the decades after WW2, including in various parts of Croatia to help instigate secession. Maybe it has to do something with the mentality of the region? There is a fantastic movie [1] by Emir Kusturica that absolutely nails the way of thinking, where a protagonist lives in a bunker believing the war never ended.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_(1995_film)

Geopolitically, the region of former Yugoslavia is extremely valuable, historically as well as in the present. Sadly, I expect renewed trouble here in the upcomming decade

Serbia isn't too important in terms of GDP, population, or military power. But a significant amount of EU trade passes through Serbia, and migrants from the Middle East use Serbia as a route to reach the EU. Since the EU has blocked Serbian accession largely over the Kosovo issue, both Russia and China are now trying to pull Serbia into their spheres of influence in order to gain more leverage over Europe.

The population of Serbia is generally pretty cynical about their government and doesn't believe the rhetoric. But they do believe in all sorts of conspiracy theories about manipulation by shadowy foreign powers.

In Serbia, for a ruling class (politicians, judges, attorneys, police), laws are more like a lax guidelines so even if this is a step back for them in the end nothing fundamentally changes.

The Share foundation posted about it as well: https://www.sharefoundation.info/en/draft-withdrawal-a-step-...

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