Foreign relations of Serbia
Serbia established diplomatic relations with most world nations – 189 states in total – starting with the United Kingdom (1837) and ending most recently with Marshall Islands (2024).
It maintains colder, more tense relations with Albania and Croatia and to a lesser degree with Bosnia and Herzegovina and Bulgaria due to historic nation-building conflict and differing political ideologies.
Former President of Serbia Boris Tadić referred to relations with the European Union (EU), United States, Russia, and China as the four pillars of Serbian foreign policy.
Serbian envoys regularly embarked on missions to states near and far, typically in large entourages bearing gifts for the foreign courts.
One such embassy to the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt arrived in Cairo bearing gifts including five hawks, five falcons, four silver cups, and an extravagantly ornamental sword.
Serbian diplomats of the time were mostly drawn from two groups; those sent to the Catholic West primarily hailed from noble families from the coastal cities of the Adriatic Sea, such as Kotor, Dubrovnik, and Bar, and those sent to the Orthodox East were frequently members of the clergy, like Saint Sava.
Vienna's strategy was that a liberal political system in Serbia would divert its impulse to foment nationalist unrest within its neighbors, and also delay its efforts to gain territory at the expense of the Ottoman Empire.
Serbia remained a principality or kneževina (knjaževina) until 1882 when it became a Kingdom, during which the internal politics revolved largely around dynastic rivalry between the Obrenović and Karađorđević families.
The Serbian king, Milan Obrenovic´ (1854–1901), who needed to divert attention away from his domestic problems, demanded that Bulgaria cede some of its territory to Serbia.
The large number of Serbs living in Bosnia looked to Serbia as the focus of their nationalism, but they were ruled by the Germans of the Austrian Empire.
[11] The main remaining foe was Austria, which strongly rejected Pan-Slavism and Serbian nationalism and was ready to make war to end those threats.
Within days, long-standing mobilization plans went into effect to initiate invasions or guard against them and Russia, France and Britain stood arrayed against Austria and Germany.
[16] Others, most notably prof. Christopher Clark, have argued that Austria-Hungary, confronted with a Serbia that seemed determined to incite continual unrest and ultimately acquire all of the "Serb" inhabited lands of the Monarchy (which, according to the Pan-Serb point of view included all of Croatia, Dalmatia, Bosnia, Hercegovina and some of the southern counties of the Hungary (roughly corresponding to today's Vojvodina), and whose military and government was intertwined with the irredentist terrorist group known as "The Black Hand", saw no practical alternative to the use of force in ending what amounted to subversion from Serbia directed at a large chunk of its territories.
[17] List of countries which Serbia maintains diplomatic relations with: Serbian foreign policy is focused on achieving the strategic goal of becoming a member state of the European Union (EU).
Serbia officially applied for membership in the European Union in 2009, received a full candidate status in 2012 and started accession talks in 2014.
[116] The relationship between Serbia and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has been regulated in the context of an Individual Partnership Action Plan.
Serbia, Russia, China, India, Greece, Mexico, Romania, Spain, Brazil, South Africa, and many others do not recognize Kosovo as an independent state.
Diplomatic relations between the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union were established on 24 June 1940, and Serbia and the Russian Federation recognize the continuity of all inter-State documents signed between the two countries.
