Vucic: We expect more Greek investors in Serbia, energy ties

BELGRADE - Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on Tuesday that, after the difficult period of the coronavirus pandemic, Serbia expected to attract more Greek investors, as well as to see more Serbian investments in Greece.

At a press conference with Greek President Katerina Sakellaropoulou, Vucic said they had also discussed energy ties to be established in the years to come and that Serbia had showed interest in purchasing certain quantities of LNG in Alexandroupolis.

He said they had also discussed infrastructure ties and that he had he had informed Sakellaropoulou of construction projects underway in Serbia.

"We will complete the high-speed rail line to the Hungarian border in less than two years, and we are also starting to build a high-speed rail line to Nis and then to North Macedonia, and a corridor connecting Budapest, Belgrade, Skopje, Thessaloniki, Piraeus and Athens is very important to us," he said.

He said Piraeus and Thessaloniki were also important for cargo transport, and added that passenger transport would help connect Serbs and Greeks.

He said he had told Sakellaropoulou Serbia had received over 62 pct of total FDI in the Western Balkans and that he believed the trend would be continued.

He said Serbia's finances were in an orderly state and that there were no structural problems.

"If we had no political conflicts with Pristina and if there was no conflict in Ukraine, we would have investment-grade credit rating. We are one notch below that right now, but we have improved the rating by four grades in the past eight years, which says enough about Serbia's success in the past years," Vucic concluded.