Pressure grows within EPP to expel Vučić’s SNS party over Mladić funeral

The EU’s largest political family linked the participation of senior Serbian officials at Mladić’s funeral to its ongoing scrutiny of the Serbian Progressive Party, which could ultimately lead to its suspension or expulsion from the EPP.

Frustration within the European People’s Party is growing over Aleksandar Vučić’s Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), with senior lawmakers urging the party presidency to consider suspending or expelling it from the EPP.

Gathered in Toulouse for their political assembly on Tuesday, EPP senior members expressed deep concern over events at the funeral of Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladić, known as the Butcher of Bosnia, who died in late August aged 84 in a UN detention facility in The Hague.

They concluded that state honours and the participation of senior Serbian officials at the funeral “cannot be ignored” in the party's ongoing scrutiny of SNS.

“There is not an inch of Vučić's policies that would fit into the EPP universe. EPP is for the people, not for autocrats,” senior EPP MEP Lukas Mandl told Euronews. Vučić served as SNS president from 2012 to 2023, when he handed over the leadership to Miloš Vučević, but he is still widely considered the party’s de facto leader.

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