President of Serbia pointed out the seriousness of the situation in which the country finds itself, pointing out that it is not just a matter of supply problems OIL. "Problems with the refinery, petrochemicals, essentially the survival of the economy we have today," said Aleksandar Vučić and added - the goal of American sanctions against The oil industry of Serbia (NIS) is clear, and that is the complete withdrawal of Russian interests from NIS.
"We would have to start with the ownership transformation plan immediately", the president further said, and the deadline for this is "only 45 calendar days".
Finally, the inattentive reader will exclaim, the authorities have realized that they cannot wait any longer, that the state must finally react and protect the interests of the citizens and the state of Serbia.
And really, it seems that in December 2025, 11 months after the United States of America introduced NIS sanctions and a full two months after they came into force, the time has come for the state of Serbia to solve this problem.
However, the president's initial quote is not from December. Aleksandar Vučić said this in January 2025, a few days before it was officially announced that the Americans had imposed sanctions on NIS due to the majority Russian ownership in the company.
Everything was clear then: what does Serbia have to do in order for a company that directly contributes almost four percent to the GDP, about 10 percent to the budget and employs more than 13.000 people, to continue to function normally.
...AND THE AUTHORITY IS COMBING
Of course, everything was clear to those in the know as early as February 2022, when Russia attacked Ukraine, and the entire "evil West" immediately started (continued) with the introduction of increasingly severe and comprehensive sanctions against Russia, and reduced its possibilities to finance the aforementioned war in Ukraine. And how was that not clear to the president of Serbia, the "leader of the free world", a genius strategist, a top chess player in international relations, who sees ten moves ahead and who, according to his own boasting, knew that Russia's attack on Ukraine was coming three months before it happened?
However, at the end of November - that is, after more than ten months since he explained precisely what kind of problem the country was in and what it had to do to get out of that problem - and after exactly zero percent of the ownership of NIS left Russian hands, Vučić said that he did not understand the logic of the Americans, that is, why they did not give NIS a license.
Almost a whole year has passed since the introduction of NIS sanctions, and, as the president often likes to emphasize, the result on the scoreboard is clear: zero, "potatoes" - that's how much the state managed to do to solve this burning issue in the past time. Information is being hidden, citizens are kept in complete ignorance, and this is one of the most important problems facing the country. In addition, the resolution is still not in sight.
Because what was the government actually doing in the months behind us? She mostly fooled the public by saying contradictory things. It took very little, for example, for the statement of Energy Minister Dubravka Đedović Handanović that "the Russians agreed to sell their stake in NIS" to the presidential statement that "the Russians do not want to sell NIS".
Or, in a similar (short) time, the National Bank of Serbia accused certain media outlets of raising panic due to the announcement of secondary sanctions, only to then announce itself that it had received a "serious warning" due to the banks' business with NIS.
Furthermore, only one day was needed for the EU to deny the lies of Serbian officials that the EU had banned the transport of Russian gas to third countries.
Let us recall that the Ministry of Energy stated in an official statement that "Serbia is in a very difficult and almost hopeless situation, since the Council of the European Union adopted a ban on the transit of Russian gas through the EU to third countries, and the measure will enter into force on January 1, 2026", and that "thanks to the excellent relations of President Vučić with world leaders, we hope to find a solution and are doing everything in our power, but the situation is almost hopeless, bearing in mind and the current situation in relation to the Oil Industry of Serbia". Marta Kos denied this "news" as early as the next day.
The list of such statements by state officials is too long. And the matter is actually very simple. Why has the state done absolutely nothing about NIS in the last 11 months? The short and, unfortunately, correct answer is: because the government, embodied in Aleksandar Vučić, does not care about the interests of the state of Serbia, but actually cares about the interests of the state of Russia. And therein lies a lot of past and present (perhaps, until the end of time?) problems that Serbia faces.
GLE, HERE'S THE ICEBERG!
Far from the fact that the problem with NIS sanctions and the consequent issue of gas supply to Serbia was the only and most important one during the past year.
Prolonged and massive protests after the fall of the canopy in November 2024, which effectively and completely exposed the autocratic and violent nature of Aleksandar Vučić's regime, mostly captured the attention of both the authorities and the public. It is quite certain that these protests and the huge social change that took place in Serbia, triggered by them, will sooner or later lead to a change in political power.
But, in the meantime, several more big problems "attracted" unnoticed to Serbia - mostly thanks to the irresponsible government, but also to the incomprehensible inaction and lack of interest of all types of media. One is the already mentioned gradual demise of NIS and its Oil Refinery. After the introduction of sanctions in January and their repeated postponement, the media did not deal too much with this topic.
Only after the sanctions came into force, in October, all the black scenarios that followed began to be unraveled in the media, and there is no end in sight: the complete suspension of the arrival of crude oil to Serbia through the only "pipe" - the Adriatic Pipeline (JANAF), the consumption of NIS crude oil reserves in order for the Refinery to continue operating, and, subsequently, the gradual shutdown of the Refinery, all the dangers of introducing secondary sanctions for the National Bank of Serbia, which will lead to the blocking of all payments abroad, loss of job and income for more than 13.000 families who are connected to NIS...
All this was not interesting to the media, nor did they warn the public about the seriousness of the American sanctions on NIS, until they hit the company and the state in the face.
source: energy agency performance report 2024Main gas pipelines in Serbia
Equally, the media did not deal much with another, related energy problem - why Serbia did not sign a long-term agreement for gas with Russia, whether there are alternatives to Russian gas, how, where, how much and from where gas can be obtained in case the flow of Russian gas stops... Until October, when we already saw the outlines of the huge iceberg that Serbia is approaching.
It was, therefore, about a first-class media event and phenomenon, for which there is a strong public interest, and which provides an inexhaustible volcano of topics - political, geopolitical, energy, economic, social... However, the government and the media showed a similar blindness.
GLE, HERE ARE THE NEW FEES!
And what can we say about the third problem, which the general public became aware of also in October 2025, even though - it too - has been "rolling" towards Serbia for years? It is about the introduction of a kind of customs duty for certain products at the borders of the EU, the so-called "mechanism for cross-border adjustment of carbon prices", that is, the abbreviation CBAM (carbon border adjustment mechanism).
What is it about? In the simplest terms, CBAM is a measure introduced by the EU to charge for carbon dioxide emissions generated during the creation of certain products that are imported into the EU. Since 2005, as part of the fight against climate change, the EU has required polluters to pay for their emissions of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, through the emissions trading system (emission units) - emissions trading system (ETS).
Given that "domestic", i.e. EU producers, have been paying this tax for years, the Union also introduced the aforementioned CBAM so that EU producers would not be in a worse position than non-EU producers who are not in the ETS system, and did not have this obligation to pay for emitted greenhouse gases (GHG).
The political agreement on the introduction of CBAM on imports into the EU was reached in 2022, the transition period for the introduction and adjustment of that mechanism entered into force in October 2023, while the collection starts from January 1, 2026. Thanks to the joint negative influence of the authorities and the media, the general public of Serbia found itself surprised in October 2025, less than three months before the start of collection - what kind of new tax is it and how much will it cost?
WHAT WILL WE DO WITH ELECTRICITY?
There is every chance that even then, in October 2025, there would not have been much talk about the introduction of the CBAM, if the Fiscal Council - one of the few remaining functioning institutions in the country - had not come out with an extensive analysis of the effects of the introduction of this levy on the Serbian economy.
What products will CBAM apply to? For now, that is. for starters, we are talking about cement, iron and steel, aluminum, fertilizer, electricity and hydrogen. All countries that will import these products into the European Union will pay a "duty" on the carbon dioxide produced during the production of these goods, in order to equalize the business conditions for producers inside and outside the EU. In addition to this, the introduction of CBAM will also prevent carbon "leakage", that is, the "escape" of producers from the EU to third countries that until now had no obligations to pay for the produced greenhouse gases.
This levy will be paid by importers in the EU, not producers in Serbia, i.e. outside the EU, however, it will still mean that these products will be more expensive for the mentioned tax, that is, producers will become less competitive on the EU market for the amount of carbon dioxide they produce during their production. The principle is simple - the less you pollute, the less you pay.
According to the calculations of the Fiscal Council, during the next year, 2026, this levy will not greatly burden the mentioned products, with the exception of electricity. If we exclude electricity, the Fiscal Council estimates that in the first year CBAM will mean a charge of two percent of the price of aluminum, up to 18 percent when it comes to cement. This institution further estimates that, excluding electricity, the EU will earn about 45 million for the import of these products from Serbia in 2026, which is explained by the fact that in the first year only a small part of the built-in carbon dioxide emissions will be charged.
However, after a "low start", it is estimated that in 2030 this collection will already be a serious 150-200 million euros, that is, due to the gradual growth of CBAM, the export of iron and steel to the EU will become more expensive by 15-20 percent, fertilizers by 10-15 percent, aluminum by five percent, and cement by about 50 percent. The goal of such growth is to force producers to find "greener" ways of production, which emit less GHG, that is, to pollute the planet less.
And then there's electricity.
When it comes to electricity, there will be no gradual adjustment and growth of this "carbon dioxide duty", i.e. carbon tax. Different rules apply to electricity and full implementation starts immediately, as of January 1, 2026. This is a problem for Elektroprivreda of Serbia as the dominant producer of electricity on the market, as well as the largest and most important company in the country, because Serbia produces more than 60 percent of its electricity in thermal power plants, from domestic and imported coal. And coal is a big polluter.
"The application of CBAM to electricity represents an urgent problem. Acceptance of CBAM means a cost of 200-300 million euros per year in the period 2026-2030 (due to full implementation from the first year), as well as the risk of Serbia becoming an isolated "energy island" in Europe, while jeopardizing the business of EPS, since each MWh of electricity exported from Serbia to the EU would receive an additional burden of around 60 euros," writes the Fiscal Council in an almost dramatic tone, which is extremely unusual for otherwise very measured reports that this institution makes.
On December 3, the Parliament passed the Law on the Tax on Gas Emissions with a Greenhouse Effect, which foresees a charge of four euros per ton of carbon dioxide emitted, but not on the total production, but on the difference between the total emission and the "reference emission", which represent the "technologically justified level" of emitted carbon dioxide.
These four euros per ton of CO2 it will not mean much for EPS exports, although the tax already paid in the country should be deducted from what will be charged in the EU. This difference will continue to be large, ie. the amount that will burden the price of EPS exports to the EU will still be around 60-80 percent. However, the problem will affect not only EPS but also all other manufacturers, because electricity also enters into the "carbon footprint" they create during production. And, according to the assessment of the Fiscal Council, due to the use of lignite, EPS emits 3-4 times more carbon dioxide than the EU average when producing electricity.
It is also estimated that due to the non-competitive export of EPS to the EU, the largest domestic company will have to replace that income from somewhere else, so a new increase in the price of electricity is certain, but, for now, there are no official announcements about it.
photo: ntc-nis / robert getel...
SERBIA, "PAINTED" IN THE CORNER
And so, while states and private companies have been preparing for the "green transition" for years, a gradual change in the way electricity is produced, the government in Serbia was completely uninterested in any deep and essential changes in decades of energy and climate policy.
Moreover, with personnel solutions and consistent negative selection, she led the Electric Power Company of Serbia to literally collapse at the end of 2021, when production stopped because too much mud was put into the furnace of the "Nikola Tesla" Thermal Power Plant together with coal.
The same, if not even more aggressive, personnel policy of the current government led to the fact that the country of Serbia, at the end of 2025, will be thoroughly and systematically, as in cartoons, "painted into a corner" when it comes to oil, and when it comes to gas, and when it comes to electricity.
And not only that, but everyone was surprised - where did this come from all of a sudden.
This text was supported by the Czech organization AMO
