are we assuming Niko was serbian

[Aquamaniac]

I think it is clear that he is Serbian, I just wonder in which conflict he fought, at the encounter with Darko Brevic, Darko states that he betrayed their unit, because their unit killed friends/neighbours of him. Maybe they were Bosnian Serbs in Bosnia where Bosnians and Serbs lived side by side for a long time and Darko felt more affiliated with his Bosnian neigbours, I think this is more likely than he felt affiliated with Albanians, because Serbs have been a long time a minority in Kosovo and lived rather seperated or I am writing nonsense?

 

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/the-bosnia-crisis-serbs-croats-and-muslims-who-hates-who-and-why-tony-barber-in-zagreb-traces-the-1539305.html

 

That Roman marries in a Catholic Church is no clue at all, he is most likely Atheist/Agnostic.

 

BTW I only recently met a guy who is Serb, speaks Croatian, is a Muslim and looks like an Arab. At the end we do not definitly know on which side Niko fought in which war, though he hardly is a Muslim. Usually Russians and Orthodox Serbs are said to get along well, this might be a hint, that Niko is something else. Neither Bellic/Bellič, Brevic nor Cravic seem to be actual names, this means Niko might have a totally fictitious background.

 

PS: I think it is most likely that Niko is an Ethnic Serb from Croatia and that he was involved in the fightings in the

Republic of Serbian Krajina and that his mother still was living in Croatia when the game takes place (Croatia is apart from Slowenia the only reasonable place where rich foreigners would buy property as mentioned in E-Mails but Slowenia saw little violence during the wars). Croatia had a Serbian minority even after the wars. If understand right, Niko's unit commited crimes against locals which was the reason for Darkos betrayal (dialogue at that their encounter) but also Niko's faction suffered atrocities (dialogue with Faustins wife), both Serbs and Croatians commited war crimes in the region.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic_of_Serbian_Krajina

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serbs_of_Croatia

Edited May 11, 2018 by Aquamaniac

[Digital Aum]

I know this is an old thread but I recently started playing the game again.  I always thought he was Serb.  But Croat does seem as plausible... However someone in this thread mentioned that due to his age, he would have been too young to have participated in the Croat and Bosnian wars.  But would however fit the age range for the Kosovo war.  And he's certainly not Albanian.  So that makes sense... Although when he encounters Albanians in LC, him or Roman don't show any particular hatred for them.  But that could be a PC thing... 

Also somebody said the "Yellow House" (organ harvesting ring) in Albania was run by Serbs... You have that backwards.  The theory(never proven), is that it was run by the KLA (Albanian) and the victims were mostly Serb and other non Albanian).  

So I would say that Niko is Serbian (I noticed his darts colours match the flag year's ago, dead giveaway).  But now believe the war he participated in was the Kosovo war, not the earlier ones.  As this makes more sense due to his approximate age.

[billiejoearmstrong8]

On 6/27/2021 at 5:06 PM, Digital Aum said:

I know this is an old thread but I recently started playing the game again.  I always thought he was Serb.  But Croat does seem as plausible... However someone in this thread mentioned that due to his age, he would have been too young to have participated in the Croat and Bosnian wars.  But would however fit the age range for the Kosovo war.  And he's certainly not Albanian.  So that makes sense... Although when he encounters Albanians in LC, him or Roman don't show any particular hatred for them.  But that could be a PC thing... 

Also somebody said the "Yellow House" (organ harvesting ring) in Albania was run by Serbs... You have that backwards.  The theory(never proven), is that it was run by the KLA (Albanian) and the victims were mostly Serb and other non Albanian).  

So I would say that Niko is Serbian (I noticed his darts colours match the flag year's ago, dead giveaway).  But now believe the war he participated in was the Kosovo war, not the earlier ones.  As this makes more sense due to his approximate age.

 

The Bosnian War ended in 1995 when Niko was 16/17 so I think it is possible he fought in it. There were child soldiers in that war and it does sound like he was pretty young, he says "all the boys from the village" went to fight and stuff. Or maybe he just saw horrible stuff in that war and fought in the Kosovo one. I don't think there's any doubt that he's Serbian (Roman literally says "better than my Serbian" referring to their language in the opening scene of the game, among many other things), the only uncertainty is exactly which country he's from. Rather than being from Serbia itself he could be a Bosnian Serb for example - with him seeing atrocities going on in his own village etc that seems quite likely. I think they deliberately didn't specify the exact country because the point was people from every country or "side" could have a similar story, but yeah he's a Serb from the former Yugoslavia for sure. 

 

PC or not I think Niko and Roman just aren't the kind of people who would hold on to hate for people based on their nationality so they wouldn't just blindly hate Albanians. But I also don't think it's just a coincidence that they were in conflict with Albanians during the game.