The Serbian Ministry of Defence has received the first of six Pantsir-S1 missile defence systems from Russia. According to the President of Serbia Aleksandar Vucic, the contract was signed in October 2019 and and the order will be completed in 2020. The delivery of Pantsir-S1 was made to Colonel-Pilot Milenko Pavlovic Airport in Batajnica according to Minister of Defence, Aleksandar Vulin. The initial Pantsir-S1 for Serbia arrived days after Russian defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, visited Belgrade. Whilst Serbia is an EU candidate country, it remains diplomatically close with Russia and has ruled out accession to NATO.
The Pantsir-S1 is a mobile missile/gun air defense system designed to protect military units or installations against aerial threats as aircraft, helicopters, cruise missiles, drones, and precision-guided weapons. The Pantsir-S1 is designed by the KBP Instrument Design Bureau of Tula, Russia, and is manufactured by the Ulyanovsk Mechanical Plant, Ulyanovsk, Russia. It has the reporting code name NATO, SA-22 Greyhound. The Pantsir-S1 was unveiled for the first time to the public during the MAKS Air Show in Zhukosvsky near Moscow in 1995. Currently, the Pantsir-S1 is in service to several countries including Vietnam, Syria, Jordan, Iran, Iraq and the United Arab Emirates.
