Vucic: Serbia to double funds it is investing in CERN

GENEVA - Addressing the CERN (European Organisation for Nuclear Research) 70th anniversary ceremony in Geneva, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on Tuesday Serbia would double the funds it was investing in CERN and called on all member states to increase the funds they were providing to the organisation.

Congratulating CERN on the anniversary, Vucic noted that he was representing a full-fledged member of the organisation and that many Serbian physicists and engineers were cooperating with CERN.

"I can tell you that, in my country, we are facing a big problem when it comes to education and that we have learned a lot from (European Commission President) Ursula von der Leyen and Switzerland about the dual education system," Vucic said.

Due to the development of AI and production of electric vehicles, Serbia will not be able to produce enough power in the future unless modular nuclear reactors are introduced in the country, he said.

"But how to do that, when we have fewer and fewer nuclear physicists and nuclear engineers every year and when, at the same time, we are losing mining and geology students because that has become strange and unpopular due to this popular green movement?

I do not know what we will do, but I see that - and I am not speaking only for my country but for entire Europe - that many numbers of those scientists are declining, while they are rising in China. We do not have what they have, but we are all acting as if we were a bit spoilt and as if everything was good and alright and as if everything will improve," Vucic said.