page_title: Russia–Serbia relations
section_title: Inter-war period, Russian emigration
hierarchical_section_title: Russia–Serbia relations / History / Inter-war period, Russian emigration
caption_attribution_description: Русский: П.Н.ВРАНГЕЛЬ, митрополит Антоний (Храповицкий) и другие гости и постояльцы в «Здравнице имени генерала Врангеля» в Белграде на Дединье. Надпись на фотографии: "В первый день святой Пасхи в здравнице в Топчидере 11/24 апреля 1927 года" 15,5 х 24 см. на картоне. владельческая запись на оборотной стороне, указывающая персонажей. подклейка прозрачным скотчем. очень редкое фото. Санаторий (здравницу) для больных русских военных в Белграде устроила жена полководца баронесса О.М.Врангель (1883-1968). В первом ряду сидят (слева направо): Сергей Николаевич Палеолог (бывший русский посланник в Сербии), генерал Пётр Николаевич Врангель, митрополит Антоний (Храповицкий), архиепископ Анастасий (Грибановский), Ольга Михайловна Врангель протоиерей Пётр Беловидов доктор Николай Александрович Терещенко (начальник «Здравницы»).
context_page_description: Russian–Serbian relations refer to bilateral foreign relations between Serbia and Russia. The Ottoman Empire′s Principality of Serbia and the Russian Empire established official relations in 1838. After the dissolution of the USSR, the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia recognized Russia in December 1991 by the Decision of the Presidency on the recognition of the former republics of the USSR. Serbia has an embassy in Moscow and Russia has an embassy in Belgrade and a liaison office to UNMIK in Pristina. Serbia also announced to later open a consulate-general in Yekaterinburg.
  Diplomatic relations between the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and the USSR were established on 24 June 1940, and Serbia and the Russian Federation recognize the continuity of all inter-State documents signed between the two countries. There are about 70 bilateral treaties, agreements and protocols signed in the past. Serbia and the Russian Federation have signed and ratified 43 bilateral agreements and treaties in diverse areas of mutual cooperation so far.
  According to censuses, there were 3,247 ethnic Russians living in Serbia and 3,510 Serbs with Russian citizenship.
context_section_description: A few months after the Russian Revolution in November 1917, the Russian Civil War ensued, in which a small number of mercenaries from Yugoslavia fought for both the Russian Whites and the Bolsheviks. After the Civil War ended in 1922 in a Bolshevik victory, relations between the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union remained frosty. It was not until June 1940 that the Kingdom of Yugoslavia formally recognised the USSR and established diplomatic relations, one of the last European countries to do so.
  Since 1920, the government of the Kingdom of SHS welcomed tens of thousands of anti-Bolshevik Russian refugees, mainly those who fled after the final defeat of the Russian Army under General Pyotr Wrangel in Crimea in November 1920, explaining its hospitality by presenting it as paying back the debt Serbia owed Russia for the latter's intervention on the side of Serbia at the outbreak of WWI. The Kingdom of SHS became home for 40.000 exiles from the Russian Empire. In 1921, at the invitation of the Serbian Patriarch Dimitrije, the leadership of the Russian Church in exile moved from Constantinople to Serbia and in September 1922 in Karlovci (until 1920, the seat of the abolished Patriarchate of Karlovci) established a de facto independent ecclesiastical administration that a few years later was instituted as the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia (ROCOR). The exiled Russian clergy's devotion and dedication to the Church was held up as an example by the churchpeople in Serbia. The ROCOR's Head Metropolitan Anthony Khrapovitsky was widely viewed as a spiritual leader of all the Russian émigrés until his death in 1936.  Patriarch Varnava of Serbia (1930–1937) came to be a staunch defender and advocate of the Russian exiles in Yugoslavia and exerted constant pressure on the Royal Court and government to forestall any rapprochement and establishment of diplomatic relations between Yugoslavia and the USSR. The Russian community in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia was effectively in a privileged position in a number of ways, as it enjoyed support and protection on the part of the Karađorđević dynasty.
  The Russian military servicemen under the command of Gen Pyotr Wrangel were partly enlisted into Yugoslavia's border guard troops and deployed on the country's south-eastern and later north-western border. This service was terminated by a law passed in April 1922 that abolished the border guard troops; in 1923–1924 Wrangel's men were engaged in a contract to build a road between Kraljevo and Raška.
  At the Genoa Conference in spring of 1922, there occurred a spat between Soviet Russia's delegation and that of the Kingdom of SHS over the absence of a delegation from Montenegro; a meeting between  Georgy Chicherin and Momčilo Ninčić took place on the sidelines of the conference: the sides arrived at a pro forma agreement that the government of the Kingdom would prevent further activities of Russian émigrés in its territory. Nevertheless, Russian émigré activity continued apace: multiple Russian military officers′ associations were set up in Yugoslavia, which in 1924 were united under an umbrella council headed by the seniormost Russian generals Eduard Ekk and Georgiy Rozalion-Soshalsky. In 1924, a cavalry brigade staffed completely by Wrangel's men was formed under the command of Russian Gen Sergei Ulagay in order to overthrow Albania′s pro-Soviet Orthodox leader Fan Noli, who had seized power in June that year, and re-install Muslim Ahmet Zogu, which was carried out in December that year. On 1 September 1924, Gen Pyotr Wrangel founded the Russian All-Military Union (ROVS), until 1927 headquartered in Karlovci, a global organisation designed to unite all Russian military officers outside Russia. According to the data contained in the declassified UDBA study compiled in 1955, in 1934 ROVS's  membership in Yugoslavia totaled 25.000 people. Department IV of ROVS (Yugoslavia) was established with headquarters in Belgrade, Gen Eduard Ekk heading it until 1933. Department IV was in constant liaison with Yugoslavia's Ministry of the Army and N
caption: General Pyotr Wrangel, chairman of the Russian All-Military Union (second left), and Metropolitan Anthony Khrapovitsky (third left) in Dedinje, Belgrade, on Easter, April 1927
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