Serbian President Vučić Announces New Law to Combat Police Corruption Serbia’s president is promising to clean up the police with a tough new law. His critics say the very fact he has to do it now proves just how deep the rot — and his own political complicity — really run.

On May 20 in Belgrade’s Palace of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić framed the coming legislation as a long-overdue break with a violent past. He said criminal habits in the force “came from those years when policemen lived poorly and collaborated with criminals,” and estimated that “two to five percent” of officers are still “dirty policemen.” He argued that Serbia is now far safer, with killings at “the lowest level in history,” and vowed “zero tolerance” for any cooperation with drug dealers or criminal structures.

Earlier the same day, Vučić tied the new measures directly to the darkest episodes of the 1990s and 2000s. He recalled that “we had the most serious crimes involving the police elite,” insisting that “commanders of police units killed the prime minister of Serbia” and that police were involved in the murders of Belgrade police chief Boško Buha and general Radovan Stojičić “Badža.” The law, he says, will finally ensure that “the people will know they are protected when they see the badge.”

Pro‑government outlets lean into this narrative of rupture and control, highlighting Vučić’s promise that the new law will “prevent police and army personnel from working for criminals and tycoons” and presenting Serbia’s rising ties with powers like China as proof of stability and seriousness.

Opposition voices, however, hear a confession, not a cure. One commentator argues that the president has “publicly admitted what he has been trying to conceal for years,” calling Serbia a system where “the police [have] remained the backbone of the regime” and likening his performance to crisis PR for a state captured by a cartel. If “half of them know who every drug dealer is,” the columnist asks, why have these networks been protected for decades?

In the coming weeks, the text of Vučić’s law will show whether this is a genuine attempt to dismantle entrenched power — or just the latest episode in Serbia’s long-running drama of cops, criminals and politics.