Russia welcomes Vucic's election victory

The Kremlin has welcomed the victory in the parliamentary elections announced by the Serbian president, Aleksandar Vucic.

Serbia and Russia have historically had close relations, and Belgrade has not joined international sanctions imposed on Moscow over its unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.

Serbia held extraordinary parliamentary, local and provincial elections on Sunday.

Vučić has declared that his party, the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), has won the December 17 elections, while the electoral authorities have so far published preliminary results with 35 percent of the votes counted.

"We welcome this achievement by Mr. Vucic," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.

He added that Moscow hopes that the result will lead to "further strengthening of friendship" between the two states.

Peskov also referred to Serbia as a "brotherly" state.

According to preliminary results, the electoral list "Aleksandar Vucic - Serbia dare not stop" won 50.42 percent of the votes in the parliamentary elections, while the list "Serbia against violence" won 19.25 percent. The third is the list "Ivica Dacic - prime minister of Serbia" with 7.19 percent of the votes.

Otherwise, a significant part of Serbia's population has expressed support for Moscow's military campaign in Ukraine, expressing distaste for the NATO military alliance that supports Kiev.

But Belgrade is also an important center for Russians who criticize Moscow's war and are fleeing the country.

However, Serbia has condemned Russia's aggression and supported United Nations resolutions to condemn the war against Ukraine.

In November, Serbia's intelligence chief, Aleksandar Vulin - who visited Russia during the offensive against Ukraine - resigned, citing international pressure on Belgrade.