"Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said Serbia has strong energy reserves while announcing that his government will continue to subsidize increases in energy costs with a significant reduction in excise taxes, while warning that this policy could bankrupt the state if steps are not taken to avert the global energy crisis. Speaking in Belgrade on Friday, he noted that his government is already losing 35 million euros a month on the tax reduction in order to ensure prices for consumers rise only slightly. He accused Europe of pressuring Serbia to 'cut ties with Russia'. "Great, and what do we do then, what do we do about gas?" he noted. "You have to think about tradition, friendship and the future, about everything else." "For four and a half years, I have withstood all the pressures of this world from everyone on the outside and all the fools inside the country to destroy the policy of friendship. Why? Because they no longer know what to do with themselves, but only if you can stab the state in the back whenever the state is having a hard time," he continued. The government also capped fuel prices since 2022 and banned exports until April 2 to secure the domestic supply. Vucic defended Serbia's ties with Russia, which supplies nearly 90 percent of the country's gas, saying the partnership keeps energy costs stable. He rejected Western pressure to break ties with Moscow, even as Serbia maintains relations with the EU, its largest trading partner. The energy sector is also navigating US sanctions on Russian-owned oil companies and seeking exemptions or ownership changes for the country's largest oil and gas company, NIS, to keep supplies flowing. It comes amid an ongoing war between the US, Israel, and Iran that disrupted shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, a route for about 20 percent of global oil, driving a global surge in oil prices."