What policy toward Kosovo might the Student List pursue after its victory?

Aleksandar Vučić has conceded defeat in Serbia’s parliamentary elections on October 25 and said he expects the Student List to win a majority in the new parliament.

According to preliminary data from CRTA, the Student List is in first place with 51.47 percent of the vote, while the “Aleksandar Vučić – United Serbia” list has received 40.42 percent. These figures are not final official results.

The Student List was formed by the student protest movement against corruption, which began after the collapse of the canopy at Novi Sad railway station in 2024. Sixteen people died in the incident.

The movement is not led by a single leader. Students make decisions collectively through plenums and, in the elections, backed a list of candidates from various fields.

During the campaign, candidates said all agreements reached in the dialogue on normalizing relations with Kosovo should be reviewed. They also called for the issue of Kosovo’s status to be returned to the United Nations and for decisions to be made only after consultation with Kosovo Serbs. It remains to be seen whether the platform will be maintained after the elections.

Before Sunday’s elections, Radio Free Europe reviewed public statements by the movement, which emerged from anti-corruption protests. The position its representatives have presented as a shared one is that “Kosovo is an integral part of Serbia, as stated in the country’s Constitution.”

During the campaign, movement representatives carried copies of Serbia’s Constitution as a symbol, saying they would defend it and act only in accordance with it.

Serbia does not officially recognize Kosovo as an independent state. However, since 2011, Belgrade and Pristina have held talks to normalize relations, mediated by the European Union. Dozens of agreements have been reached in the process, which, according to many political analysts, amount to “de facto” recognition of Kosovo’s independence.

Among the latest agreements accepted at the political level by Albin Kurti and Aleksandar Vučić is the Agreement on the Path to Normalization of Relations between Kosovo and Serbia, known as the Basic Agreement. It was agreed in Brussels on February 27, 2023, following the Franco-German proposal. The agreement calls for respect for territorial integrity and provides for Serbia’s commitment not to oppose Kosovo’s membership in any international organization. The annex for its implementation, known as the Ohrid Annex, was agreed on March 18, 2023, in Ohrid.

Kosovo, for its part, undertook to guarantee Kosovo Serbs a certain degree of self-management through the establishment of the Association of Serb-majority Municipalities.

What comes next?

Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti has made the continuation of high-level political dialogue conditional on Serbia extraditing Milan Radoičić, who has claimed responsibility for the armed attack in Banjska.

So far, the Student List has not taken a clear position on this issue, although it could influence Serbia’s state policy for the next four years.

Criticism on Kosovo-related issues has focused mainly on the Serb List, the largest party of Serbs in Kosovo, founded with the support of the Serbian Progressive Party and Aleksandar Vučić. Until the Banjska attack, Milan Radoičić was its deputy leader.

A change of power in Belgrade, with Vučić’s departure and the Student List taking office, could affect how Serbia exerts political influence over Kosovo Serbs, particularly through the Serb List. But Belgrade’s ties with this community go beyond the party: institutions funded by Serbia provide jobs, salaries, pensions and social assistance to thousands of Kosovo Serbs. Education and healthcare also continue to be funded by Serbia and employ thousands of members of the community.

Four representatives of the University of North Mitrovica, which operates under the Serbian system, were also included on the student electoral list. One was Jugoslav Gašić, an assistant professor at the Faculty of Medicine. In an interview with the Belgrade newspaper Danas, he discussed the possible integration into Kosovo of educational and healthcare institutions operating in Serb-majority areas under Serbia’s system.

“If it [integration] means only registration in the so-called Kosovo system, that is acceptable to me, but integration as ‘Kosovarization’ is absolutely unacceptable,” Gašić said.

Kosovo raised this issue in September last year, arguing that the operation of two systems is unsustainable. Meanwhile, the international community says any possible integration should take place in consultation with the Serb community. It has previously criticized Kosovo authorities for closing Serbian institutions without creating alternatives for providing services to citizens.

According to Marko Savković, Vučić’s departure from power would call into question the political infrastructure built during his rule.

“That infrastructure would face crises that would be very difficult to overcome: funding crises, leadership crises and identity crises,” Savković, an associate at the Belgrade Centre for International and Security Affairs, told Radio Free Europe’s Expose program in early October.

This does not mean Serbia would stop supporting Kosovo Serbs. However, the question remains how that assistance would be organized and to what extent it would be tied to Belgrade’s political control.

Sonja Biserko of the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights believes a change of government could pave the way for a different policy toward Kosovo Serbs.

“It would be important for Kosovo Serbs if a new government in Serbia took a realistic approach toward them, helped them strengthen their position in Kosovo and guided them toward dialogue with Pristina. That would be the best solution for them,” Biserko told Radio Free Europe’s Expose.

In a debate broadcast by Serbia’s public broadcaster, Gašić said that if the Student List took power, it would seek to have the agreements signed with Kosovo brought before parliament and reviewed by the Constitutional Court. He said they could also be reconsidered.

It is not yet clear whether this process would seek to legally challenge previous obligations, politically reconsider them or change the way Belgrade implements them.

Political scientists Ognjen Gogić and Aleksandar Šljuka, who follow Kosovo-Serbia relations, previously told RFE/RL that Serbia’s next government would not be able to withdraw from the dialogue without risking its relations with the European Union.

The memorandum on Kosovo

In the middle of the year, at one of its rallies, the Student List presented its Memorandum on Kosovo. The document describes Kosovo as “an inalienable and integral part of the Republic of Serbia.”

The text was criticized by some in Serbian public opinion, who argued that the Serbian Progressive Party could not be defeated through nationalist policies. The memorandum consists of four points.

One states that the Kosovo issue “cannot be resolved in isolation, but only within the complex developments of the international community.” It also says Serbian authorities should “actively and constructively cooperate with all relevant international organizations” to find a sustainable solution “within the framework of their Constitution.”

At the end of September, the students released another installment of their election campaign, titled “The Betrayal of Kosovo.”

The Student List does not criticize Vučić for failing to recognize Kosovo. Instead, it points to developments during his rule, including the removal of license plates and the Serbian dinar in Kosovo, as well as Kosovo authorities’ closure of institutions operating under Serbia’s system.

However, the belief that Kosovo is part of Serbia, held by governments since the fall of Slobodan Milošević’s regime, is also shared by most Serbian citizens. In a 2023 survey by the Institute for European Affairs, more than 50 percent of respondents said they opposed Kosovo’s independence.

Marko Savković notes that opposition to Kosovo’s statehood did not begin with Vučić and is unlikely to end after him.

Savković told Radio Free Europe that there is still very little political room in Serbia for a fundamental change in its position on Kosovo’s status.

“When it comes to rejecting Kosovo’s statehood itself as a concept, this is certainly state policy, and some continuity can be expected here, whoever is in power in Serbia. There are few political options that accept the de facto situation, because Kosovo is de facto a state; they are on the political margins,” Savković told Radio Free Europe’s Expose program.

Biserko also does not expect a rapid change in the position on Kosovo’s status, even if a new government takes office in Belgrade.

“It is certain that, in various crisis situations, everyone will try to use Kosovo for emotional mobilization, to rally people around them. I think that, essentially, there will be no change regarding Kosovo’s status. That is out of the question,” Biserko told Expose./RFE/RL