November 2025
In the last decade, the Balkans became a strategic stage of competition of big powers again, but in a completely different geopolitical format in comparison to the period of the Cold War. While the European Union battles its institutional fatigue, slow expansion and internal divisions, and the United States is shifting the focus towards Indo-Pacific and global suppression of Chinese influence, new axis of power emerges in the region, which resemble less classical blocs, and more fluid lines of competitive economic and security structures. In an environment like that, the Balkans finds itself in the position of a “soft spot” of Europe, but also as a hub through which trade, energy, and political gravitations of China and Russia pass, each with its own methods, tools, and long-term ambitions.
Even though we often speak of the “return” of Russian and Chinese influence, it is more realistic to say that the region today is in a phase of pragmatic refurbishing of foreign policy options. Neither Moscow nor Beijing acts through ideological tensions; their approach is much more accessible, directed towards the offer of infrastructure investments, energy security, military technical cooperation, and loans. For the majority of Balkan Governments – especially the ones in the countries that are not members of the EU – such offers appear as compensation for the lack of clear European guarantees and the slowness of reforms that Brussels is asking for. Exactly this space of insecurity represents a key point that both powers try to fill.
The Russian approach to the region in the last ten years had three different phases. The first one was diplomatic energy, which relied on traditional connections, especially in Serbia and the Republic of Srpska, where the Kremlin used the symbolic capital of Orthodox and historical alliance. The second phase, which intensified after 2014 and even more after 2022, extends into the domain of political and security influence: the intention was not to push the Balkans completely from the West, but to create a sufficient dose of institutional fragmentation so that the integration process would slow down, and the political elites would have an alternative channel of communication with Moscow. In the third phase, which is ongoing, Russia is operating with reduced capacities, but it still tries to maintain its presence through media influence, hybrid operations, and energy dependency, especially in times of political crises.
Contrary to Russia, the Chinese entrance into the Balkans is quiet, detailed, and with long-term planning. Beijing uses two basic instruments: investments through the Belt and Road initiative and loan arrangements which, on one side, enable fast realization of infrastructural projects, and on the other, open up the door to the spread of Chinese companies in the energy, telecommunication, and transport sectors. For many countries of the region – from Serbia and North Macedonia to Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro – the Chinese capital represents the only real opportunity to modernize the infrastructure, especially in the fields where EU does not offer fast enough or lucrative enough programs.
The Chinese approach differs because it does not bring along the political conditions in the classical Western sense: there is no insistence on judicial and media reforms, and the fight against corruption. This is attractive for some governments, but in the long run, it creates the risk of dependence that is not measured only through money, but also by overtaking the critical infrastructure and the strategic sectors. This is exactly why Beijing is more and more competing with not only the EU, but also with Turkish and Arab investment funds that try to take up some part of the same space.
Despite different methods of action, the Chinese and Russian interests have one point of intersection: as the Balkans gets institutionally weaker and politically more fragmented, their entry channels become wider. For a region that is still facing the unstable dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina, internal tensions in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and long-term problems of corruption and demographic drain, this is especially dangerous.
However, it should be stressed that the Balkans is not a passive object. Regional elites balance between different centers of power, using their relations with China and Russia as a tool for negotiation with the EU and the US. Such a politics of balancing is not necessarily negative; in some cases, it enables the countries to maximize their interests. The problem arises when this balance grows into a permanent ambivalence that prevents institutional reforms and leaves the region vulnerable to foreign pressures.
In the next five years, three key trends are expected. The first is the growing Chinese presence in energy and logistics. The Chinese companies already have a strong position in railroad and road transport, and the planned projects in the field of production of the electric industry and battery industry can make the region dependent on Chinese technology in the critical moment, when Europe is trying to reduce its own dependence on China.
The second trend will be the reduction – but not the disappearance as well – of the Russian influence. It is to be expected that Moscow will keep its symbolic capital and political connections, especially in the countries with strong pro-Russian sentiment, but its real economic and military influence will be significantly limited. Because of that, Russia will probably turn to the strategy of “minimum investment – maximum destabilization”, i.e., the tactics of maintaining the influence through targeted political and media interventions.
The third trend refers to the role of the European Union. If the EU does not accelerate the expansion process and offer a clearer and financially more beneficial mechanism of including the Balkans in common energy, technology, and security policies, the region will remain open to an alternative model of cooperation offered by China, and to a lesser extent, Russia. An additional challenge represents internal debates within the Union itself, which can postpone strategic decisions on accession, with which the “grey zone” in which the Balkans functions without full guarantee of stability is extended.
When we look at all three models together, the Balkans will not be the stage of open conflict of big powers in the following period, but a zone of quiet, but permanent competition. In such an environment, the political elite of each country will have to answer the key question: are the short-term uses from the economic cooperation with Beijing and the political support of Moscow worth the long-term strategic dependence? And what is even more important, can the region afford to remain a strategic void when the global order is redefined quickly?
The Balkans are at the crossroads that is not only geographical, but also political, economic, and civilizational. The stakes are much higher than single projects or temporary political alliances; we are speaking of whether the region will have enough autonomy to manage its own future. In the world in which the centers of power are shifting, and the rules of the game are changing, the Balkans must decide whether it wishes to be just a platform only passed by the trains of big powers, or a hotspot that manages its own direction of movement.
Author: Krasimir Tanchev