Zelensky landed in Belgrade and sat down with the man who has spent four years balancing between Brussels and Moscow without once falling to either side. The first official visit by a Ukrainian president to Serbia. And straight away, at the joint press conference, the host told him our Balkan truth to his face.

„As a political veteran, at this moment I do not see any possibility of Serbia becoming an EU member soon,” Vučić said. Then he added why: „They will always find somebody. For us they will find Croats, Bulgarians or the Dutch, and for Ukraine somebody else.”

The sentence is accurate even when the man saying it has his own reasons for saying it. Anyone in the Balkans who has waited at Brussels' door knows what it looks like when a process sold to you as technical suddenly becomes a matter of somebody's national calendar and somebody's parliament.

In the same breath Vučić promised Serbia would never obstruct Ukraine's European path and boasted that he had not heard a bad word about his country from Zelensky. One promise that costs nothing and one compliment that commits to nothing - diplomacy as we know it.

Zelensky was shorter and darker. He described the situation in Ukraine as very difficult, with ballistic missiles and drones hitting infrastructure the previous night as well. Then he talked about what people actually come to Belgrade for: infrastructure, the economy, jobs on both sides.

The entire visit produced one signed document - a memorandum of cooperation between the Serbian Agriculture Ministry and Ukraine's state food safety service. The two presidents also confirmed mutual support for territorial integrity under the UN Charter. A formulation anyone can sign, because it commits to nothing specific.

But the most interesting sentence came off to the side of the main topic. Vučić announced that around 15 or 20 September Serbia will open a drone factory - with the Israelis. No location, no capacity, no drone type, no investment value. Just a date and a partner.

And that is where the picture comes together. On the same day the host receives the president of a country being defended with drones, he announces he is starting to produce drones with a third party, and when asked about military cooperation with his guest, he replies that it was not discussed - „not in times like these”. When the war ends, he says, that is another matter.

Serbia has not imposed sanctions on Russia, sends ammunition that by some strange route ends up on the eastern front, and is now hosting the Ukrainian president at the Serbia Palace. If that is balancing, it is balancing with both hands full.

The question that remains is not whether Vučić is right about Brussels. The question is who benefits from his analysis. When the man who has waited longest at the European door explains to everyone else that the door does not open anyway, that is both a prediction and an alibi.