China Influence Operations Target Western Balkans

Chi­na’s influ­ence oper­a­tions in the West­ern Balka­ns employ sharp pow­er tools blend­ing sur­veil­lance tech­nol­o­gy, defense trans­fers, and media manip­u­la­tion to sway the region toward Bei­jing. On 5 Novem­ber 2025, Small Wars Jour­nal report­ed that, unlike Rus­si­a’s dis­rup­tive cyber­at­tacks and dis­in­for­ma­tion, Chi­na focus­es on tech­no­log­i­cal depen­den­cies through Huawei telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions, black­list­ed sur­veil­lance firms Hikvi­sion and Dahua, and mil­i­tary sales posi­tion­ing Ser­bia as Chi­na’s pri­ma­ry mil­i­tary client and iron­clad strate­gic part­ner in Europe. The arti­cle begins:

In the West­ern Balka­ns, Chi­na blends sev­er­al oper­a­tional domains to sway the region toward Bei­jing and expand itself in Europe. Unlike Rus­sia, which employs dis­rup­tive active mea­sures like cyber­at­tacks and dis­in­for­ma­tion through prox­ies and inter­me­di­aries, Chi­na embraces “sharp pow­er” tools cen­tered on defense trans­fers, selec­tive invest­ments in crit­i­cal infra­struc­ture, and tech­no­log­i­cal depen­den­cies in sur­veil­lance and mon­i­tor­ing. In many ways, Ser­bia wel­comes Chi­nese influ­ence and serves as a so-called “iron­clad strate­gic part­ner”. To counter Chi­na’s ris­ing influ­ence, the US and NATO allies must adopt proven meth­ods that strength­en secu­ri­ty and adapt to the chal­lenges of hybrid war.

Read more: https://smallwarsjournal.com/2025/11/05/chinas-rising-influence-in-the-western-balkans/

Key Points

• Chi­nese state media out­lets, includ­ing Chi­na Glob­al Tele­vi­sion Net­work, Xin­hua News Agency, and Chi­na Radio Inter­na­tion­al, dis­trib­ute pro-Bei­jing con­tent through­out the West­ern Balka­ns via region­al cable oper­a­tors and online por­tals in Ser­bian, Alban­ian, and Croatian.
• Chi­na facil­i­tates media con­tent-shar­ing agree­ments between Xin­hua News Agency and out­lets in Ser­bia and Bosnia and Herze­gov­ina, pro­motes jour­nal­ist vis­its to Chi­na, and dis­trib­utes doc­u­men­taries that rein­force Chi­na’s offi­cial posi­tions on polit­i­cal and eco­nom­ic themes.
• Ser­bian police installed thou­sands of Huawei smart cam­eras feed­ing into law enforce­ment data­bas­es as part of Bel­grade’s Safe City project, while at least 40 munic­i­pal­i­ties deployed $32 mil­lion in sur­veil­lance equip­ment from black­list­ed Chi­nese firms Hikvi­sion and Dahua.
• Con­fu­cius Insti­tutes and aca­d­e­m­ic exchanges rein­force Chi­nese state author­i­tar­i­an­ism, while Huawei oper­ates a One Thou­sand Dreams ini­tia­tive to attract young peo­ple and pro­mote aca­d­e­m­ic exchanges with schools in Chi­na to embed Chi­na-friend­ly narratives.

China’s Expanding Influence in Serbia: Universities, Media, and State Power Converge

Ser­bia stands as the East­ern Euro­pean coun­try most vul­ner­a­ble to Russ­ian and Chi­nese influ­ence, accord­ing to the 2021 Glob­sec Vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty Index. This vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty stems from per­va­sive cor­rup­tion, state cap­ture, and an infor­ma­tion space flood­ed by pro­pa­gan­da and dis­in­for­ma­tion that impede devel­op­ment of a more demo­c­ra­t­ic and resilient soci­ety. The gov­ern­ing Ser­bian Pro­gres­sive Par­ty has ruled since 2012, with par­lia­ment lack­ing legit­i­mate oppo­si­tion fol­low­ing the 2020 elec­tion boy­cott. This dynam­ic endan­gers demo­c­ra­t­ic plu­ral­i­ty while cre­at­ing reper­cus­sions on for­eign pol­i­cy, with the gov­ern­men­t’s pro-Krem­lin and pro-Bei­jing ori­en­ta­tion going uncon­test­ed by domes­tic opposition.

Pub­lic atti­tudes mir­ror the gov­ern­men­t’s for­eign pol­i­cy ori­en­ta­tion. Ser­bian soci­ety is par­tic­u­lar­ly sym­pa­thet­ic toward Rus­sia and Chi­na com­pared to oth­ers in the region, while main­tain­ing antag­o­nism toward NATO and ambiva­lence about EU mem­ber­ship. The pub­lic admin­is­tra­tion’s numer­ous flaws com­pound these chal­lenges, cre­at­ing an envi­ron­ment where Chi­nese influ­ence can expand rel­a­tive­ly unchecked. Beyond tra­di­tion­al eco­nom­ic engage­ment, Chi­na is expand­ing its influ­ence using Hun­gar­i­an and Ser­bian uni­ver­si­ties, rep­re­sent­ing a shift toward deep­er insti­tu­tion­al pen­e­tra­tion. This aca­d­e­m­ic coop­er­a­tion includes Confu­cius Insti­tutes that oper­ate with lim­it­ed scruti­ny, despite the grow­ing crit­i­cism these insti­tu­tions face across the Euro­pean Union, where sev­er­al chap­ters have closed amid con­cerns about pro­pa­gan­da dis­sem­i­na­tion and inter­fer­ence with cam­pus free speech.

Chi­na’s influ­ence in Europe con­tin­ues increas­ing through aca­d­e­m­ic part­ner­ships even as most Euro­pean coun­tries have blocked Huawei’s abil­i­ty to build 5G infra­struc­ture. Ser­bia’s tra­jec­to­ry con­trasts sharply with region­al trends, as the coun­try has embraced com­pre­hen­sive coop­er­a­tion with Bei­jing span­ning sur­veil­lance tech­nol­o­gy, media con­tent-shar­ing agree­ments, and defense part­ner­ships. Dur­ing Pres­i­dent Xi Jin­ping’s May 2024 vis­it, three pro-gov­ern­ment media out­lets signed coop­er­a­tion deals with Chi­na Media Group and Xin­hua News Agency, estab­lish­ing frame­works for con­tent exchange that crit­ics warn will ampli­fy pro-Bei­jing nar­ra­tives in an already com­pro­mised infor­ma­tion envi­ron­ment. The com­bi­na­tion of polit­i­cal align­ment, pub­lic sym­pa­thy, insti­tu­tion­al part­ner­ships, and media coop­er­a­tion posi­tions Ser­bia as Chi­na’s pri­ma­ry hub for influ­ence oper­a­tions through­out the West­ern Balkans.

Exter­nal References:

• Chi­na Deep­ens Its Balka­ns Ties Using Ser­bian Universities
• Ser­bia’s Pro-Govt Media, Pres­i­den­t’s Press Ser­vice, Sign Deals with Chi­nese Media
• Glob­sec Vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty Index 2021

Dis­claimer: The Glob­al Influ­ence Oper­a­tions Report (GIOR) uti­lizes AI through­out the post­ing process, includ­ing the gen­er­a­tion of sum­maries for news items, intro­duc­tions, key points, and, often, the “con­text” sec­tion. We rec­om­mend ver­i­fy­ing all infor­ma­tion before use. Addi­tion­al­ly, all images are gen­er­at­ed using AI and are intend­ed sole­ly for illus­tra­tive pur­pos­es. While they rep­re­sent the events or indi­vid­u­als dis­cussed, they should not be inter­pret­ed as real-world photography.