Serbia’s authoritarian leader personally stepped in to push forward an allegedly illegal plan to give a protected site in Belgrade to a Trump tower, the Guardian can reveal. Aleksandar Vučić called officials to a meeting at his presidential offices about the project, which has led to a historic indictment of senior figures in his government on charges of abusing public office. The criminal case is thought to be the first to come from the Trumps’ global money-making efforts, which critics describe as a “pay to play” setup where things like sanctions relief or advanced chips are available to those who enrich the first family and their associates. The alleged plan to remove the protected status of a historic building in the Serbian capital hangs over an election set for 25 October, when Vučić will try to extend his 12 years in power despite a large protest movement driven by government corruption. View image in fullscreenJared Kushner and Serbian president Aleksandar Vučić in Belgrade. Photograph: Instagram/Aleksandar Vucic A nationalist and former propaganda chief under Slobodan Milošević, Vučić hosted US president’s son Donald Trump Jr and son-in-law Jared Kushner in Belgrade as they worked on plans for a $500m hotel and residential tower to add to their global property holdings. After the abuse of power charges were filed last December, Kushner’s company said the project would not move forward “at this time.” Vučić threatened retaliation, calling the prosecutors “corrupt gangs” who “fabricated cases.” View image in fullscreenScreenshot from Trumpbelgrade.com showing renderings of the proposed Belgrade development. Photograph: Trumpbelgrade.com “We have lost an exceptional investment,” the Serbian president said. “I will personally make sure that everyone involved in causing this damage is held accountable.” Vučić’s culture minister is among those charged with abuse of power. But a Guardian investigation, using interviews and leaked documents, shows that the Serbian president himself led the first meeting where the alleged plan was discussed. This key meeting is not mentioned in the indictment, raising questions about what information prosecutors are withholding and why. Representatives of the Trumps and Kushner said they had no role in removing the building’s protected status and that it would be “false” to say the Belgrade project was part of a “pay to play” scheme. Vučić did not respond to requests for comment. His decision to call a snap election means a hearing where witnesses might reveal details of his involvement will not happen until after the vote. A free 99-year lease On 6 February 2024, Dubravka Đukanović, a Serbian conservation professor in her 60s, arrived for a meeting at the presidency, a domed former royal palace. For three years, she had been director of the country’s institute for the protection of cultural monuments. The topic was the General Staff building, the former Yugoslav ministry of defence in central Belgrade. The building, an architectural gem seen as a symbol of resistance to the Nazis, was already valued when Nato forces bombed it in 1999 during its campaign to force Milošević to withdraw from Kosovo, deepening its importance. View image in fullscreenAleksandar Vučić and Donald Trump Jr in Belgrade. Photograph: Facebook/Aleksandar Vucic Vučić himself had reaffirmed the General Staff building’s legally protected status in 2016. Now, the president said he wanted Đukanović to cancel it, according to two people with knowledge of the meeting. Some unspecified “foreign investor” was interested in the site. Under Serbian law, removing the General Staff building’s protected status was not something Đukanović could decide on her own. Her institute would have to commission an expert opinion, which would have to conclude thaThere were good reasons why the site no longer deserved protected status. But the president wanted it done. At 6ft 6in and unwilling to tolerate disagreement, Vučić can be intimidating. Sources said his tone toward Đukanović and another heritage official present was unpleasant. He told them they were lazy and incompetent. The message was clear: do what I want or resign.
A likely explanation for Vučić’s forceful intervention came the following month, when an agreement between the Serbian government and Kushner’s real estate company leaked.
Married to Trump’s daughter Ivanka, Kushner had been an influential White House aide during his father-in-law’s first term. Since Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 election, Kushner had been focusing on his investment fund.
By early 2024, Trump was charging toward the Republican nomination and was the favorite to win the coming election. If Trump took back the White House, Kushner would once again be one of the most influential people on the planet.
The leaked agreement showed that the Serbian authorities had granted Kushner’s company a 99-year lease on the General Staff site, free of charge.
Kushner, whose spokesperson said he had been looking at the project since 2021, posted an image of the design on X and said he was “excited.”
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The news was not universally welcomed in Belgrade. “Serbia is not a buffet, and Vučić is not a waiter,” said Aleksandar Jovanović Ćuta, an environmental activist who revealed the agreement. “This is not his private property.”
Yet Vučić’s regime went on to sign a contract, dated 13 May 2024 and seen by the Guardian, promising that the site’s “cultural heritage designation” would be removed “to the satisfaction” of Kushner’s company.
Comply or resign
The week after the contract was signed, Đukanović was summoned to another meeting. The president was not there this time. Siniša Mali, his finance minister and right-hand man, took charge.
Mali urged Đukanović and Olivera Vučković, Belgrade’s top heritage official, to cancel the General Staff site’s protected status, according to the indictment’s summary of testimony the two women would later give prosecutors. It makes no reference to the earlier meeting with the president but indicates that the subject had been raised before.
“Mali asked them if they had given it any thought,” the indictment says, “and if they would initiate the procedure to remove the building’s protected status.”
The women refused, “believing that the legal conditions for it were not met.” In that case, Mali told them, repeating his boss’s ultimatum from February, they should resign. They did.
In her resignation letter, which the Guardian has seen, Đukanović wrote that she could not agree “to inappropriate interventions that would permanently destroy all the values of the complex, which testifies to the highest achievements of contemporary Serbian architecture and is of incalculable importance for preserving enduring creative values, the education of future generations, and the strengthening of the cultural identity of the Serbian people.”
Approached by the Guardian, Đukanović and Vučković confirmed the accuracy of this account. Đukanović added: “I prefer not to make any statement on this matter while the court proceedings are ongoing.”
Little was heard of the General Staff plan for months. In November, Trump beat Kamala Harris to win re-election. Ten days later, Vučić’s government announced that the General Staff site had been stripped of its protected status.
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Serbian students and Belgrade residents hold a banIn November 2025, a protest in Belgrade read “We won’t give up the General Staff building.” Photo: Andrej Isaković/AFP/Getty Images
Keeping it in the family
One of the first things Trump did when he became president again was to break the promise he made in his first term that his family business would not make deals abroad while he was in office.
“The scale of corruption will be orders of magnitude greater than what we saw in the first Trump administration,” Kathleen Clark, a government ethics lawyer at Washington University School of Law, warned at the time. She said Trump had made it much easier to buy his favor.
The family business stayed officially under the control of his two oldest sons, Don Jr and Eric. In January 2025, four days after their father’s inauguration, Eric spoke about some new projects. The Trumps and the Kushners, two New York real estate families connected by marriage, had decided to work together for the first time: Kushner’s Belgrade hotel and tower would carry the Trump name.
“It’s going to be fun to bring the family together,” Eric told the New York Times. “Serbia is one of the fastest-growing countries in Europe, and we’re incredibly honored to be there.” Kushner, who had traveled to Belgrade for what Vučić called an “inspiring” meeting with the Serbian leader, added: “Our research showed that the Trump brand would be the best for this market.”
That brand has seen a surge in demand around the world during Trump’s second term, along with allegations that it comes with a quid pro quo.
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Jared Kushner joins Donald Trump and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio at the inaugural meeting of the Board of Peace at the Donald J Trump Institute of Peace. Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
In Vietnam, Eric was showered with confetti at the groundbreaking ceremony for a £1.5bn golf resort, whose permits were granted unusually quickly. Then Trump halved Vietnam’s tariffs. The Saudis poured money into Kushner’s fund, and plans appeared for a Trump plaza in Jeddah. Then Trump agreed to sell the kingdom new US fighter jets. A cryptocurrency baron’s company and senior Emiratis made a lucrative deal with World Liberty Financial, the digital currency venture founded by Don Jr and Eric. Trump gave the crypto baron a pardon and gave the Emiratis access to restricted US chips.
Asked about such deals last year, Kushner, now a presidential envoy to Russia, Israel and elsewhere, said: “What people call conflicts of interest … I call experience and trusted relationships that we have throughout the world.”
Those who build “trusted relationships” with the Trumps, even without an obvious quid pro quo, gain something less tangible but perhaps more valuable: the aura of friendship with a president who is happy to use his superpower to make or break smaller nations and their leaders.
Vučić has plenty in common with Trump. Both are friendly with Vladimir Putin and contemptuous of the EU — in Vučić’s case, despite his country having applied to join. A shared disdain for NATO may help explain why the one part of the General Staff building’s heritage that the redevelopment promised to keep was a memorial to the alliance’s “aggression” against Serbia.
And there is a lot Vučić could use US help with, not least the fate of Kosovo, which he says is still part of Serbia.
Not long after his father returned to office, Don Jr landed in Belgrade. Vučić said that during their meeting he “emphasized the importance of the economic and political relations between Serbia and the USA and stressed the importance of strategic cooperation between the two countries and joint projects in the years to come.” When Don Jr returned the following month, Vučić fed him a choice sucking-pig.
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For Vučić, support from the first family came at the right time. Days before his government removed protection from the General Staff building site, a canopy collapse at Novi Sad railway station killed 16 people and sparked ongoing protests against corruption. The student organizers’ slogan became “Serbia or mafia.”
Don Jr.’s visit came just before the largest demonstration in Serbia’s history. He invited Vučić onto his podcast, Triggered, and claimed that the Serbian leader’s opponents were “weaponizing” the Novi Sad disaster, just as Trump’s opponents had done with the Capitol riots after his 2020 election loss.
But the protesters kept their momentum and began rallying against the Trump tower. In May 2025, Vučić went to the US, hoping to visit Trump at Mar-a-Lago, his Florida club. He met with Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s disgraced lawyer, but not the president. State media reported this was because Vučić fell ill.
As soon as Vučić returned home, police arrested Goran Vasić, the man installed as head of the heritage institute to replace Dubravka Đukanović after her resignation. Prosecutors said Vasić had forged a supportive expert opinion to get the General Staff building’s protected status canceled.
More arrests followed. In December 2025, Vučić’s culture minister was indicted for abuse of office for his alleged role in the General Staff scheme. Within days, Kushner’s company announced the project was off.
Coup or cover-up?
Vučić’s threat of retaliation was not empty.
His allies attacked Đukanović, claiming she had tried to profit personally from her time as a heritage official. Her deputy, who received a visit from state security after she went on television to denounce the cancellation of the General Staff building’s protection, has been accused of unrelated misconduct. The Serbian conservators’ industry body said this had “the obvious aim of discrediting her.” Both are expected to testify in the criminal proceedings.
For the special organized-crime prosecutors who brought the charges, this is a landmark case. Never before has a sitting Serbian minister been indicted.
Vučić accuses the prosecutors of staging a coup. Others, however, fear they are holding back. That concern grew when Nikola Selaković, the indicted culture minister, used an April court appearance to reveal that while police were raiding his ministry, he was in his office drinking plum brandy and smoking cigarettes with Mladen Nenadić, head of the organized-crime prosecutors’ unit. The unit’s spokesperson said there was “no discussion regarding the course of the case.”
“In everything that happened regarding potential investments, I saw a chance for our country and citizens,” said Selaković, who faces three years in prison if convicted.
Vučić has not been charged. Neither has his lieutenant, Mali. Both deny wrongdoing.
View image in fullscreen. Aleksandar Vučić addresses the 81st UN general assembly in September. Photograph: Eduardo Muñoz/Reuters.
The indictment refers to evidence from witnesses who were present at the Vučić meeting in February 2024 but does not mention it, raising questions about the apparent decision to omit what would seem to be a key part of the narrative.
The spokesperson for the organized crime prosecutors’ unit said it had evidence regarding Vučić’s February 2024 meeting with the heritage officials. Beyond those already indicted, prosecutors were “conducting pretrial proceedings in this case to determine potential criminal liability of other persons as well,” the spokesperson added.
Vučić has stepped down and cannot seek another term but is expected to retainIf he is elected prime minister on 25 October, he will consolidate his control over the regime. In one of his final acts as president, he issued 49 pardons. Some of the recipients have not been identified, and it is unclear whether they include defendants in the General Staff case.
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The White House referred questions to the Trumps’ company. Its representative said: “The Trump Organization has no plans to develop any project in Belgrade, was never, at any point, involved in any discussions or negotiations to acquire any site in Belgrade, and denies any involvement in or knowledge of the alleged claims.”
Kushner’s spokesperson said: “The suggestion that Jared Kushner pursued the Belgrade project as part of any political arrangement or ‘pay to play’ scheme is categorically false.” Rather, it was “an opportunity to transform a site associated with a painful chapter in Serbia’s history into a symbol of healing and reconciliation, while bringing substantial private investment, jobs, and economic opportunity to Belgrade.”
The spokesperson added: “Jared had no involvement in the Serbian government’s internal processes concerning the site’s protected status.”
For all Vučić’s difficulties, the tale of the Trump Tower Belgrade does not appear to have deterred others from doing business with the first family. Trump retains stakes in dozens of his companies, even if his sons nominally run them. In July, he released his financial disclosure for his first year back at the White House. It showed he had made $2bn.
Frequently Asked Questions
FAQs Serbian Leaders Secret Role in Illegal Effort to Aid Trump Business
Beginner Questions
What is this story about
Its an investigation reporting that Serbian officials secretly worked to help a Trumplinked business project possibly in violation of lobbying or foreign influence laws
Who is the Serbian leader mentioned
The reporting refers to a senior Serbian government figure accused of quietly coordinating efforts to benefit a Trump business interest
What does illegal effort mean here
It means the actions may have broken laws such as failing to register as a foreign agent or violating lobbying disclosure rules
Why is this a big deal
Because foreign governments are generally banned from secretly influencing or financially aiding US political or business figures
What is a foreign agent
Someone who works on behalf of a foreign government or entity and is legally required to register with the US government
Intermediate Questions
What law might have been broken
Possibly the Foreign Agents Registration Act which requires disclosure of foreignbacked political or lobbying work
What was the Trump business involved
Reports point to a real estate or branding deal in the Balkans that benefited from the secret assistance
How did the Serbian leader help
Allegedly by using government resources connections or influence to smooth the way for the deal without public disclosure
Did Trump or his company know
Thats a key question The reporting suggests the aid was covert but its unclear how much the Trump side knew
Why would Serbia do this
Possibly to curry favor with Trump hoping for better US relations or business deals in return
Advanced Questions
What are the legal consequences if proven
Possible penalties include fines criminal charges and damage to diplomatic relations
How does this compare to other FARA cases
Its similar to past cases where foreign governments secretly lobbied or aided US figures without registering
Whats the difference between lobbying and foreign influence
Lobbying is trying to sway policy foreign influence is broader any effort by a foreign power to affect US politics or business
Could this affect USSerbia relations
Yes If confirmed it could strain trust and lead to diplomatic fallout
What should people watch for next
Congressional hearings FBI or DOJ investigations and whether
