The collapse of Serbia’s Novi Sad train station roof last month killed 15 people and severely injured two others, igniting weeks-long, nationwide protests against government corruption that is widely perceived to be at the root of the tragedy. In the middle of the fray are two Chinese companies that were involved in recent renovations at the train station, which is a key stop along the Chinese-built Budapest-Belgrade Railway. Given the Serbian government’s enthusiastic embrace of Chinese investment under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and the general lack of transparency surrounding Chinese contracts, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and China’s ties with Serbia are now under pressure, especially given Vucic’s refusal to publicly release all contracts related to work at the train station. On Thursday, Jens Kastner at Nikkei Asia reported on the possible extent of Chinese companies’ responsibility for the incident:
Notably missing is the contract the government signed with China Railway International Co. (CRIC) and China Communications Construction Co. (CCCC) on May 28, 2018, for all the work from Novi Sad to Kelebija, a village on the border with Hungary, according to the NGO [Transparency Serbia].
The Novi Sad train station renovation was led by the two Chinese companies, which denied working on the canopy, saying it was constructed at the same time as the old station building. But footage on Serbian social media accounts suggest the collapse was caused by heavy glass recently installed on the canopy.
their role is to serve as an umbrella contractor under a special agreement between Serbia and China that has confidentialitA Serbian civil engineer told Nikkei Asia that, legally, CRIC and CCCC may be right in their claim of not having carried out the work themselves, as their role is to serve as an umbrella contractor under a special agreement between Serbia and China that has confidentiality clauses for almost all contract articles.
[…] While the Chinese companies may not have conducted any work themselves on the canopy, they bear responsibility for subcontractors they use. [Source]
In late November, Serbia’s construction minister and the director of Serbia’s state-run railway company were among 11 people arrested over the train station collapse. Both of them stepped down, but other top leaders such as Prime Minister Milos Vucevic, who was mayor of Novi Sad when construction started at the train station, remain in their posts. Days after the arrests, scuffles broke out in the Serbian parliament after opposition legislators raised banners accusing the ruling coalition of trying to shirk responsibility for the train station collapse. Over the past six weeks, students have occupied over 40 universities in Serbia in support of the anti-corruption movement, and the government announced early winter holidays to curtail protests.
Nemanja Nenadic, Director of Transparency Serbia, told France24: “We are confronted with situations where the government directly violates anti-corruption rules. It calls them ‘Projects of National Importance,’ so no minister, neither the prime minister nor the president, would be sanctioned, even if they signed a contract with a company without competition or a tender, even for a contract worth a billion euros.” Serbia and China typically negotiate agreements on a government level without outside bidders, which leaves questions regarding quality, safety and financial sustainability. In a People’s Daily feature from May about China and Serbia deepening infrastructure cooperation, an “experienced engineer from Serbia” who has “supervised road construction projects for many foreign companies” said that the work done by Chinese builders is “more efficient.” But Milica Stojanovic at Balkan Insight described how these particularities of Chinese partnerships do not necessarily benefit the Serbian public:
Yet when local Novi Sad broadcaster Radio 021 asked Serbia’s construction ministry in January to see the contract for the renovation, the ministry responded that the Chinese partner “does not agree that any data from the contract and related to the contract should be provided to third parties before the end of the project, that is, before receiving a certificate of a job well done”.
Chinese investment in the Balkans has long been dogged by concerns over corruption, labour rights, environmental neglect and so-called debt-trap diplomacy in which China builds influence over indebted states. Serbia, for example, owes Export-Import Bank of China 2.75 billion euros for a total of 14 projects, plus a further 104.6 million to the Hungarian branch of Bank of China.
Ivana Karaskova, China Research Fellow at the Prague-based Association for International Affairs, AMO, said that if such deals lack transparency, “then probably the conditions are not very favourable for the local populations”. [Source]
On Friday, Serbian Foreign Minister Marko Djuric traveled to Tianjin to meet his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi, who according to a China Daily readout “welcomed Serbia to ride the ‘express train’ of China’s development and work together to achieve modernization.” Several days after November’s incident, Chinese Premier Li Qiang met with Serbian Prime Minister Milos Vucevic in Shanghai and said, “It is hoped that Serbia will continue to provide a sound business environment for Chinese enterprises to invest and do business in Serbia.” In May, Xi Jinping visited Serbia during his first trip to Europe in five years and received a red-carpet welcome. Serbia’s growing relationship with China has complicated its prospects for E.U. integration, as Douglas Brenton Anderson wrote this month for European Guanxi.
