Welcome to the new episode of New Magazine's podcast
Understanding the Steel Friendship.
Our today's guest is Dimitrije Milic from the New Third Way.
We will have a chance to hear more about the work of his organization,
but also of the ways in which China has been presented in the most read
media portals in Serbia, as well as how the citizens of Serbia perceive
the cooperation between Serbia and China.
This is the third episode in the row of podcast Understanding the Steel
Friendship, so I would like to invite you all to follow up on YouTube's
Channel NM New Magazine, and you can find the episodes
on all relevant media podcasts, such as Spotify, Deezer and Apple.
Dimitrije, good afternoon, welcome to NM podcast,
welcome to the podcast Undestanding the Steel Friendship.
Thank you very much for inviting me.
You are here in the capacity of representative of New Third Way,
and the topics that we will cover today are crucial for understanding
the fact that China has become one of the main foreign, economic
and generally political partner of the Republic of Serbia.
This is a perception of the citizens of Serbia, as well as the perception
of the common people in China, on the ways in which citizens of
Serbia regard this cooperation between China and Serbia.
Your organization has several ongoing projects and I look forward
to your sharing with us some of the data that you have collected
in the previous period, as far as your research had lasted.
Maybe we could start with a brief introduction of yourself,
and with a question which we pose to all our guests,
and that is the following: when you hear the phrase
Steel Friendship, what first comes to mind, what is you perception?
When it comes to a phrase itself, it is easy to answer.
I first think of Smederevo Ironworks or Hesteel Serbia, from which this
phrase originates, as it perhaps was, as perceived by the citizens,
in a symbolic way, a moment when China has become, in an economic
aspect, much more present, as we used to hear for years,
how much it costs us on a monthly and annual level when steel factory
operates in Serbian ownership, what seemed to be the problems,
with the management, after US Steel departure, etc...
So, this is the first association that comes to mind.
As for our research, which is a leading topic,
this is the research that we've been working on since May 2023.
It consists of three elements. It should measure to what extent
and in what way, local public opinion, be it in media or general
standpoints of the citizens, perceive the great powers.
Meaning United States of America, European Union, China, Russia,
as well as some of the less powerful states, such as Hungary, or Belarus,
in a word, any state that has certain impact on Serbian political views,
or can be discussed in Serbian political arena.
As we can see in current international circumstances,
those are the issues pertaining to Serbia's foreign policy,
and its international context are very much represented in media.
So, our research has been carried out on a two-month basis,
we review in what ways fifteen most relevant news portals in Serbia
informed about all key stakeholders, in what way they mentioned them,
we think about major states and organizations, including China,
and how they reported on their leaders, in China's case, Xi Jinping.
It was helpful to see how they are represented in media,
how is China presented, in what way is Xi Jinping
presented, also compared to other leaders and states.
In the same time, we made focus groups in the cities where China
has significant presence, more than average, that is.
Those are the places with significant Chinese investments,
with important infrastructure projects being carried out,
with the assistance of Chinese companies.
Finally, we had conducted public opinion polls, measuring standpoints
of the citizens on many issues, it involved general questions
regarding China, how they would rate China on the scale from 1 to 7,
how they would rate Xi Jinping, but also the question of China's
role in the world, China as political and economic partner of Serbia,
China compared to other stakeholders, and who is more relevant to Serbia.
We can discuss this further... -Yes, by all means.
I think we should have two parts for discussion, the first being
China in the media, and the second, the results of the perception of
public opinion, but what I find important to mention,
your organization is a young but established organization.
Thank you. -The researches you've carried out
are being referred to as highly representative, so I would like
to know how Third New Way was established, I mean...
The initial reaction would be that we have these two key policies,
we have this new third way, perhaps it was your giding idea
in thinking up such a title of your organization, but maybe it would
be best to hear brief history of the organization itself.
How you gathered a group of young people, but well
positioned people in this expert sphere where their researches
are already being referred to as most relevant ones.
First of all, thank you for such a nice presentation,
as for our organization, we have established it back in 2017,
with the aim of offering a new approach to political analysis
in Serbia, especially when it comes to foreign policy,
given that majority of people who used to establish organizations,
mainly represented now in our work, were mostly from the political sphere.
So, we noticed that the number of foreign policy analysts is deficient,
both in the media field, but also with regards to showing interest.
For a start, we were interested in foreign election processes
in different states worldwide, but soon we wanted to connect
our own interests with the things that were in demand on the market.
This consists of monitoring how key international stakeholders and
crucial international events, such as election processes in different
countries in the West or in other world regions, are presented in the
local public opinion, with our main goal being to implement knowledge
that we've acquired during education and articulate our general interests
into something that could be useful to the others as well.
Our idea was to remain independent from the local political context,
as the biggest problem in Serbia is that when you want to take up
some business, this easily becomes politicized, one way or the other...
So, we wanted to make something completely new, hence the name of
our organization, and it should be independent from any current
political options. Also, majority of organizations are called Center for
this, Centar for that, etc... When you are new,
and you want to enter the market, if you are named Center for something,
you would soon sink deep as far as your name is concerned,
as the established players would always refer to their famous name.
So, this is the history of the name, of our organization, in a nutshell.
For the last year and a half, or even two years,
we've focused on improving our research capabilities, in order to
better understand this geopolitical part, in the context of citizens'
standpoints, and given the impact that media have on local politics
and on domestic foreign policy, having in mind that it largely
depends on the positions and emotions of the electorate.
We will continue with researches until 2025, as our central project
ends then, but we hope to continue with it even later on as we follow
trends that are present for some time now, and I think that those
trends should be monitored in future on two-month level.
You have given quite a good introduction to our main theme.
This is how China has been perceived, first in the media, and then with the
citizens of Serbia. Let's start with some point of reference,
something that is probably recognizable, let's go back
to March 2020, showing billboards throughout Belgrade...
Someone who hadn't dealt with politics on such deep level but
rather superficially, probably wouldn't know how Xi Jinping
looks like, or who is our new brother, as it said on billboards.
As I see it, cooperation between Serbia and China, the modern one,
starting from 2008-2009 onwards, has been under the radar,
until Covid-19 pandemic broke out. The pandemic itself made China
recognizable in the households all over Serbia.
Maybe back then we got new outlines of promoting
China in the media, done in two ways, according to my opinion.
The first one is direct promotion of China, where we have China as
central part of certain articles and media researches,
the second is promoting China indirectly, through our politicians,
primarily from rulling coalition, or rulling political party.
Let's first discuss media coverage. To what extent do your researches
rely on this, and is my assumption right or wrong when it comes to
the perception and presentation of China in our media, including
the cooperation between Serbia and People's Republic of China.
Well, I can refer myself to the current context as well,
but also to the pandemic as my organization carried out media
monitoring back then, in Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Montenegro,
pertaining exactly to vaccination, or how immunization process was
conducted in those three states, data are being available to our
citizens on the website of our organization, under the section
publications, where there are publications concerning this issue.
One publication is fully devoted to Sinopharm, the way how this vaccine
was presented, of course, in a positive way, compared to others.
This was a pattern that occurred later in political issues, issues
that were not related to health. In what way?
Our organization had monitored 15 media outlets on a monthly basis,
certain most read news portals, those include websites of the
newspapers with highest circulation, the most watched broadcasters,
but also the media that rely solely on its web portal.
So, when you look at those 15 media outlets that we regularly
updated in relation to their readership-viewership,
so total number was 17, as two media used to go back and forth on the list.
Do you happen to know top three most relevant media outlets?
Those are Kurir, Blic, Mondo... Those were among top three.
There are others that were close to the leading ones...
Where China was mentioned. When we look at total media output,
Russia and Ukraine occupied disproportionatelly more space.
Namely, Russia, Ukraine, and some other stakeholder, such as European
Union or United States of America had taken up 50 percent of space.
The same goes for the leaders. However, despite the fact that
China was not so presented quantatively, it had the most
positive stable presence compared to all other foreign policy actors,
in that sense that it was presented in a positive way, there were more
positive than negative articles, that was always two-digit, with
the exception of several months, from May last year.
There are several reasons for that. On the one hand,
it is true that major part of Chinese positive presence in local public
sphere depends on state officials, i.e. meetings with former Ambassador,
and with members of management of Chinese companies in Serbia,
where the focus lies on the positive effects of Chinese investments,
or positive impact of Chinese companies on infrastructure in Serbia.
There are announcements of a Trade Agreement with China,
the visit to China that has been realized several months ago...
All of this helps in generating positive articles.
In parallel with the new positive articles linked to the Government
of Serbia and President of Serbia, there are articles with positive
reference to China, pertaining mainly to some global events.
Meaning, representing China as future world super power.
Positive achievements that China has in the field of high technology,
China's achievements when it comes to military investments, et cetera...
The same goes for some of pro-Russian media, where
China has been presented as Russia's ally more than it really is.
Or as future block of developing nations, such as BRICS block,
which became very important topic in Serbia at the beginning of this
year, as it is being mentioned as alternative to the West, at least
in the pro-Russian media, however crucial factor of pro-Russian media
in Serbia is that we have Russian media such as Russia Today or
Sputnik, which are source of the articles that could contain some
pro-Chinese elements, but they are not widely read in Serbia,
they are ranked below 50, but they present a source
for larger media outlets in Serbia, that are pro-Russian, which take
up their articles, meaning those that speaks affirmatively of China,
so those articles find their way to our citizens.
Of course, there are some of Chinese media whose articles
reach domestic media, such as China Radio International,
sometimes, Global Times, especially if it criticizes NATO,
or USA, so also this element sourced in Chinese media,
finds its way to Serbian media, but to much less extent than
it is the case with other states. -There are two things that
I would like to straighten out. And one additional question.
So, speaking roughly, we have Chinese International Radio,
a.k.a. China Radio International, a kind of Chinese Reuters,
so to speak, we have CGTN, China Global Television Network,
which could be called China CNN, then we have CCTV,
let's call it China BBC, in absence of any other news sources.
Those are three dominant media, along with media houses such as
Global Times, China Media Group, that coroborated with certain
Serbian media outlets, or engaged Serbian journalists to record news
for them that are in 99.9 percent positive, or in affirmative context.
True. But we can say that in the context of total number of
produced articles, it is still sporadic.
As for the number of references, China does not take big part,
it is less being referred to than USA or European Union,
it is also less referred to than Russia or Ukraine, however,
when it is being mentioned, it is done in an affirmative context.
It is interesting that, when it comes to Xi Jinping,
he is being disproportionately less mentioned than China,
also compared to other political leaders of other states.
It seems interesting that the photos in the articles pertaining
to China depicits Xi Jinping, without mentioning him.
So, it happens often that local media which are anti-Western
oriented, or pro-Russian, those are quite compatible in Serbia,
I would say 95 per cent, they use photos of Xi Jinping while writing
about China, not about him. So, he personifies China,
but his personality is not being analyzed beyond that,
so he is a poster boy of China, in certain sense,
there's no analytical approach, his politics isn't closely scrutinized.
So, if we turn to the new media, China is presented in domestic media
as a vital economic partner, this is the first element,
and as the second element, it is a counterbalance to the West,
as a goal of that part of the media that are anti-Western,
that China will be future super power that would ally with Russia
and make the global order that would suit Serbia.
This is the message we can make out of it,
with rather superficial dealing with China itself.
We noticed that number of articles dealing with some interesting things
about China had grown during last year.
Look at this interesting China monument, tourism in China,
let's learn about this festival in China that
gathered many more people than such festival in the USA, etc.
Those kinds of benign articles. -It is interesting that you've
mentioned this as specific form of media content emerged in our
public broadcaster, we have a time slot, I believe every Tuesday night,
starting from 8 p.m. on RTS2, China produced documentary
is being aired, it always deals with the sentiment you mentioned,
it deals with certain cultural event, or with some part of Chinese culture,
which they regard relevant to be promoted on a global level,
and we also have several cable channels who started rebroadcasting
content that focuses on China, we have channels that deal with
tourism, and there are weekly and even daily shows, promoting
reasons for which we should visit China and what we need
to see there as tourists, but I actually wanted to initiate
another matter with you. You mentioned anti-Western
media and a pro-Russian, let's call it, sentiment,
and a way that could be compared, how China is presented in media,
and how Russia is being presented. Have you perhaps mapped out in your
research, especially after the launch of Russian aggression in Ukraine,
that there has been a shift in the popularity of China in the
group of media that are anti Western in their orientation?
Maybe, I could give an example.
Some other researches indicate that if we consider positive perception of
citizens of the Republic of Serbia, China has now become more popular
than a Russian Federation. That is to say, majority of Serbian citizens
regard China in an affirmative context rather than it's the case with Russia.
Especially after the war with Ukraine had broken out.
Is there a similar situation when it comes to the media?
Well, when we speak about media, China stands better than Russia,
because when it comes to Russia... It is evident in our publications
on two-months basis, for instance, in our latest publication, we have
established a trend from March 2022 to August 2023, we have made a
comperative analysis as to how Russia and the United States
were presented within every month. This analysis shows that Russia's
presentation was volatile, changeable, unstable, for the first quarter period
it was rather strongly positive since the start of the invasion.
Afterwards, it experienced drastic fall, and it had periods of relative
balance, with a slight preference of affirmative articles, let's say
until March 2023, I say perchance, because at this moment, there is
tendency that affirmative articles dominate over negative ones.
This is a trend for the start of this year, and if we look at
the overall trends, we can say that strongly positive trend
shifted to the partly neutral, only to become moderately affirmative.
As for China, we have simply continuous positive representation
which hasn't got ups and downs, it is not so strongly affirmative as
was the case last year, but it is still more positive not only compared
to Russia, but also compared to any western country or Ukraine or Turkey.
As for western states, we have a strong regularity that positive
results are rather rare, EU is probably positive,
or France, and this is where the list ends.
All other countries are faced with a red line, double digit percent zones.
I believe we now touched on our next topic - Serbian citizens.
In other words, public opinion. This is also something that your
research is focused on. Maybe, we should start with a basic issue.
To what extent is China relevant to the citizens of Republic of Serbia,
in its capacity as our partner, and whether they are interested
or whether they care how Serbia cooperates with China and what
might be the repercussions of that cooperation?
When it comes to public opinions, we discovered a certain pattern
when it comes to China, as on two-month level,
we have certain topic regarding China.
Whenever we conducted research, China was of our interest one way
or the other, both in a political and economic aspect.
When speaking about the general view of China, every poll since June 2022,
consists of 1 to 7 scales, measuring different stakeholders, both states
and its leaders, and as a rule, Russia, China and Hungary
had always had the best average score.
It ranged from one to seven. One being the worst, seven the best.
They had around four, an average score.
So, 4,50 was an average score for all the three states.
Sometimes, Russia excelled, only to be taken over by Hungary later.
Putin was the most popular leader, or it was Orban...
China had a firm third place as a state, and Xi Jinping as leader.
Their average score exceeded 4, out of 7 as the highest rank.
This is general opinion that hadn't changed a lot.
When it comes to some specific traits, there are certain changes.
Namely, China grows in citizens' perception as economic partner,
but as political partner, its growth is not significant.
We conduct polls every two-months, asking our citizens whom they regard
as the most significant economic partner or political partner.
In the political sphere, we always have Russia as a leader,
second place belongs to European Union, the third belongs to China.
In a political sense, citizens identify China but only as the third.
This is most common for the ruling party voters
than for any of the opposition party. Both far-right ones, or pro-EU
inclined voters. On the other hand, when we regard economic partnership,
on the one hand, there is no aspect of belief, at least not in our polls,
that the most important economic and political partners of Serbia are
Russia and China. Namely, citizens of Serbia realize that it's EU today.
Thanks to media monitoring, we can claim that President of
Serbia takes most of credit for that, who kept saying that European Union
is our most important economy partner, it was communicated to the public.
That's why the citizens also share that opinion.
The second rated is China, with a growing share.
So, Serbian citizens regard China as an important economic partner.
China occupies second position with a double digit result.
Around 20 percent of citizens regard China as such today.
Of course, there's the issue of its current role and so on.
What seems to be important, and what seems to be the reason why
the citizens do find it agreeable to regard China as political partner,
even when we carried out focus groups in places with Chinese
investments, even those citizens who oppose Chinese investments,
or the ways in which those investments are being implemented,
are not necessarily against cooperation with China at macro level,
meaning on the level of bilateral relations of Serbia and China.
The reason for this stands in the fact, we see it in the media and
with the citizens, that China has been presented as future super power.
It should happen pretty soon, meaning in the next decades,
according to citizens' perception. When we asked them whom they
regard as a leading super power in 2040, China leads with two-thirds.
Along with the United States, with some fifteen percents...
Then Russia follows, with 10 percent, and other countries with one-digits,
such as India, European Union, et cetera, et cetera...
This creates perception with the citizens that this is the country
that will be a major decision-maker, and that it is good for Serbia to
establish good relations with it. It is also evident in focus groups.
When you want to check the findings from the quantitative media research
by establishing the reasoning that lies behind it.
Of course, there's a risk, which is rather unusual, that the citizens
identify and that was not present in the media before.
In the media, we haven't got a story about our indebtedness
towards China, and the problems that some states had faced with
by becoming indebted to China, for diverse infrastructure projects.
I would add here, not in those media that are available to general public.
Yes, but I would say that this was not a topic in other media as well,
in those media that are being read by a certain subgroup, those that
have critical approach towards the government's policies,
the other topic was not frequent with those media as well.
On the other hand, focus groups show that the citizens themselves
use to take up on that risk, fretting our becoming burdened
with indebtedness towards China, calling it problematic.
They do not cite world examples, but it is as if they depict them.
Meaning that if China's debt is not settled, then China will take
over some of the infrastructures, which is rather interesting,
given that the media hadn't communicated it as hazardous.
There are also ecology related topics that are vital for certain parts of
citizens, and where they feel major distrust towards China.
It is interesting that you've mentioned this issue...
Two things are crucial here. The subjet of China in the media,
according to my experience, is linked mainly with the events.
If we have some new joint project announcement or
major bilateral visit, media will focus on this issue for days,
or maybe throughout longer period of time, but it will soon
be trown into oblivion, returning to standard communication channels.
On the other hand, although there are scarce information on the risks
and challenges of establishing cooperation between Serbia and
China, it seems that we still witness that grassroot activist
moment on the local level, where we have China investments,
which in a way raises consciousness, often in a limited capacity, though.
This concern remains, but it doesn't impact the general perception of the
citizens towards People's Republic of China or Chinese
organizations that do business in Serbia...
It is quite interesting question concerning the positioning of
political parties, or people engaged in creating public policies on both
local and national level, maybe even on higher levels...
To cut to the final part of our conversation, do you consider
China becoming so dominant or polarized topic such as a
relationship between Serbia and Russia for some political parties?
We had a campaign conducted prior to parliamentary elections in 2020,
where one of the burning issues was whether Serbia will introduce
sanctions to Russia or not, so this was shifted to political discourse
after the elections. Do you think that China becomes such a topic
for political parties, meaning also for the citizens that do not deal
with politics but are closely following it,
or you think that this topic will remain relevant only to some
parts of the society, or the media, not on such a high level that other
partners of Serbia are, such as European Union,
maybe even the United States of America or Russia?
In this sense, China is less polarized topic in a way that,
if we look at the results of citizens' viewpoints in relation
to China, the positions we have are not so strong as in case of Russia,
and more precisely, Vladimir Putin. This is so because we do not feel
such a deep sentiment towards China as we feel towards anti-globalism.
If we review this eighteen-month poll experience with our citizens,
we come to the point that Serbia's expectations with regards to this
global liberal order established in the world back in the nineties,
on the part of western countries, is built on the detriment of Serbs.
Meaning that it's in Serbia's interest to gather all the parties that oppose
it, not only western countries, but including others as well,
making them strong enough to take down this order.
Be it China, as the most powerful among them, according to citizens'
perception and also in reality, economically wise. Be it also
Vladimir Putin's Russia, along with Victor Orban in Hungary or perhaps
Donald Trump. For example, Donald Trump has twice better
average score than Joe Biden, if you ask our citizens.
The reason for that primarily lies in his perception.
In that sense, China regards it more or less as a tool...
So, it is a serious question whether Russia would have scored so well
if it was led by Navalny or Chubais, instead of Putin, for instance.
It probably wouldn't. It would then reach a red zone...
The same goes for France, if it's being led by Marine Le Pen.
It is more up to this. This is the reason why
China is being instrumentalized as counterbalance to the West,
with which we should cooperate as circumstances might change.
In 2040, China will be regarded as super power, it's a good perspective
for Serba. So, China is still not a polarized issue in that
whole package of anti-Western rhetoric.
However, China is rather important element.
I want to wrap up this discussion with yet another question.
As a state, Serbia is not in disagreement with numerous
states on the global level, yet it fully support the One China policy.
The One China policy is the position that there is only one
sovereign state under the name China, while all
disputed territories are understood to be Beijing-administered territories
including Taiwan, which is a de facto independent state
according to many other criteria, although unrecognized by the
large number of states. You and your organization
are among a few who managed to establish cooperation with one
organization from Taiwan or with representative office of Taiwan
in Budapest. I am aware that you are not in a position to reveal all
information but I would like you to inform us broadly on your attempts
to organize an event that Taiwan has been focused on.
So, an event that is not focused on the Central China but on Taiwan
as a disputed entity that can be perceived as integral part of China.
As for our cooperation, our leading idea was to hold an event that would
deal with different approaches of China as a state, in terms of its
communication towards our region, and especially focusing on Serbia
as the most important partner of China in this region, and
towards the island of Taiwan, where things are different.
So we wanted to compare experiences of an event taking place in our region
and in the South China Sea. When it comes to Taiwan,
there are lots of disinformation coming from China, the campaign
itself is rather aggressive, while when it comes to our region,
we have moderately positive messages, cooperation with
the state of Serbia, with an attempt to cooperate with state bodies and
state institutions, and so on. It is different in Taiwan.
Our aim was to see the differencies.
Of course, it always carries some controversy in itself for several
reasons, one of the main ones being that when you communicate
with Taiwan, you are opposing state policy that does not recognize
Taiwan as an independent state. The second element is that there
is certain reserve when it comes to any criticizing tones on China,
as when you see that we posted several polls about Taiwan,
we came to the conclusion that Taiwan is being looked upon as
a new Ukarine by our citizens and in the media, interpreted
by Russian propaganda as new U.S. satellite state,
serving to challenge the bigger power in order to make certain state weaker
through the American money. This is how both Ukraine and
Taiwan are being presented, without any particular comments.
So, we established cooperatin with Taiwan in relation to that specific
event that was being organized, and given that COVID measures
were being in effect back then, it was realized in online sphere,
and that's what made this event rather controversial back then.
It was rather interesting and this is the issue that we didn't
mention, just as an additional information...
When you look at the data of the National Bank of Serbia,
up to 2021, you will see that we had separate findings for China,
along with Chinese province Taiwan and Hong Kong.
However, if you visit the portal of the National Bank of Serbia today,
you have One China, with a note written in small letters at the bottom
of the page that these include data on Hong Kong and Taiwan.
On Taipei... -Yes, Chinese Taipei...
Our state policy is even stricter when it comes to the position of
Taiwan, it is less being perceived as a separate entity than we used
to regard it as such in the past. -The policy of our organization
is that someone from Serbia should nurture relations with Taiwan,
and further develop them, as all establish relations with China,
but we don't know what the future brings in political circumstances,
whether due to international pressure and the region where Serbia belongs,
we would be forced to change our policy, we don't know
what course international relations would take in the next decade...
Taiwan is currently on the opposite side of the Beijing government...
Until that happens, what seems relevant now is that Serbia,
as a state aspiring to join European Union one day,
will adjust its policy with official policy of the European Union,
as EU also currently supports One China policy, so I believe
that both in narratives and in media appearances and reports,
the presentation of China would remain the same.
It will not differ much compared to the perception of our EU partners,
along with the stance of the United States of America.
I would end this discussion for the time being, although I believe
that there's room for deeper insight into many issues that we've launched.
I would like to thank you sincerely for your time and for providing
insight into the activities of your organization, but also into the
main aspects of media presentation of China and media coverage of
the cooperation between Serbia and China in Serbia,
along with the brief insight in Serbian public opinion,
and what Serbian citizens say when being asked about China.
My brief conclusion would be that this will continue to be
a dominant topic in the next decade, or two or three decades,
but certainly a topic that has a potential to develop further,
on some, let's say, higher level, as it seems that it is not yet
proportionate to the cooperation between Serbia and China,
while it is in our interest, judging by media content,
that this should be balanced and leveled off in near future.
We will see where it will get us when we meet next time.
Until then, I want to thank you for being our guest,
and I am certain that you will continue to do great job in
future, as you had done so far.
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to present our work.
I am also certain that this topic will gain relevance in future,
due to the intensity of cooperation that Serbia decided to establish
with China, so I believe that in a year and a half, when we finish
this project cycle, we would be able to make a retrospective,
presenting all the events that took place in this turbulent time,
both when it comes to relations between Serbia and China, and
Serbian foreign policy in general, as perceived by our citizens.
Dimitrije, many thanks once again.
You're welcome. Thank you for inviting me.