On December 28, from north to south and east to west, student booths will be set up across the country in order to collect signatures in support of the students’ call for snap parliamentary elections. Students note that their goal goes beyond signature collection and extends to building connections with the broader population.
Six and a half months. That’s how long members of the Novi Sad branch of the Movement of Free Citizens (PSG), Marija Vasić and Lado Jovović, along with STAV activist Lazar Dinić, spent in detention, both in jail and under house arrest. For almost two months, Dimitrije Dimić, a student in Niš, wore an ankle monitor. All of them are facing charges of organizing the violent overthrow of the constitutional order. But for the foreseeable future, they will (hopefully) be able to freely prove their innocence. Jovović, Dinić, and Dimić spoke to Mašina about the past months and their reactions to the courts’ decision to lift the previous restrictions.
November 1 marks one year since the recently renovated railway canopy collapsed in Novi Sad, killing 16 people. The city is expected to host a large protest, and the atmosphere is one of anxious anticipation. Thousands of students will march from Belgrade to Novi Sad, receiving a grandiose welcome, as has happened countless times before. Will this protest mark a new beginning for the student movement?
Bogdan Jovičić, a student at the Faculty of Technical Sciences in Novi Sad, had been on a hunger strike for 12 days and is currently in the Special Prison Hospital in Belgrade. He is reportedly in stable condition, according to the Administration for the Implementation of Criminal Sanctions. Serbian President Vučić referred to Jovičić as a “hooligan” and claimed to not know that the student had been shackled while attending his father’s funeral, as seen in a viral photograph.
An independent laboratory analysis conducted by students of the Faculty of Sciences (PMF) in Novi Sad shows that at a protest on September 5, police officers deployed chlorobenzylidenemalononitrile, known as CN gas. CN gas is a more dangerous variant than the usual tear gas, chloroacetophenone which is known as CS gas.
Once again, tear gas, arrests, and beatings characterized Friday’s protest in Novi Sad. Under the slogan “Serbia, can you hear us?” protesters marched to the Faculty of Philosophy, where police had been stationed for ten days but have since dispersed. Approximately 20,000 people attended the protest, according to the Archive of Public Gatherings, which has catalyzed a new wave of protests including one today called by students today in downtown Belgrade.
All day, police blocked the entrance to the State University in Novi Pazar (DUNP), a Muslim-majority city in southeastern Serbia. In the early hours this morning, masked individuals forcibly removed student protesters from the building, leaving one student injured. As students from across the country flocked in support, students regained access to the building and chanted “Victory!” Citizens are now organizing protest blockades across the country in solidarity.
The Higher Public Prosecutor’s Office in Belgrade has announced that it has given an order to the First Instance Public Prosecutor’s Office to form a case regarding the alleged misappropriation of property from the Student Cultural Center.
Dean of the Faculty of Philology Iva Draškić Vićanović gave the students that were blockading the building until 4pm to leave the building, stating that the reason is the entrance exam taking place there. Students have asked the citizens to join them in a support rally at 3pm outside of the institution in question.
The Freed SKC initiative reports that, this morning, the police and SKC admin broke into the freed building of SKC in the Kralj Milan 48 street.
The government’s tactic of pretending not to notice civil rebellion and a comprehensive social and political crisis, i.e. to play the waiting game over a long period of time has, at least it appears so, started to work. Summer’s begun, the intensity of protests has gone down, the students are slowly returning to their academic duties. Despite everything though, small fires of resistance are continuing to ignite, mostly on the local level. What remains is the question of how to continue, that is, how to fulfill the main demand put before the regime – the calling of snap parliamentary elections?
Despite the administration denying it, the destruction of the Belgrade fair complex has unofficially begun. Students have called on citizens to gather in front of Sajam on 17th of July, so they could, as they state, stop “the destruction of another symbol of our city.” During the action, police detained one student and two citizens.
Classes are formally starting, quotas have been approved, and entrance exams set. In some places, online classes are being met with boycotts while university students are met with repression. Still, the fight for autonomy of universities and a just society is not stopping with the instatement of online classes – it’s just transforming.
For a week, street blockades and other acts of civil disobedience have broken out throughout Serbia. In Belgrade, Niš, Novi Sad, and other cities, citizens have been blocking intersections and major roads to demand that the government hold snap parliamentary elections. In response, the police have been beating and arresting students and citizens alike – further fueling outrage and raising the stakes of a movement that shows no signs of backing down.
The student protest on St. Vitus Day, a significant national and religious holiday in Serbia, was held on Saturday in Belgrade. 140,000 people joined while supporters of the ruling Serbian Progressive Party gathered in their counter protest in Pionirski Park. Here’s a breakdown of what followed.
Students blockading their universities yesterday filed a criminal complaint against the President of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, for what they describe as an unauthorized visit to an intensive care unit on March 17, when he visited North Macedonian citizens who were severely burned and injured in a fire in the city of Kočani.
The recently appointed Prime Minister of Serbia Dr. Đuro Macut and the Rector of the University of Belgrade Dr. Vladan Đokić, have reached a series of verbal agreements regarding the continuation of work and the “preservation of the integrity and credibility” of the University of Belgrade. Plans are in now place to hold entrance exams … Read more
In a video published by students blockading universities, the Rector of the University of Belgrade and other professors stated that, for the first time in 200 years, a decision has not yet been made regarding the enrollment of a new generation of students.
Students and citizens spent the last two nights blockading the public broadcaster, Radio Television of Serbia (RTS), in downtown Belgrade. Since April 14, students had blockaded several broadcasting centers in Belgrade and Novi Sad to call for a new bid by the Regulatory Authority for Electronic Media (REM) or for RTS to be shut down due to its inaccurate reporting on the current uprising in Serbia.
Students blockading faculties at the University of Novi Sad announced a daring and exhausting journey of over 1,000 kilometers to deliver documentation on human rights violations in Serbia to the European Court of Human Rights.
Belgrade students will host peers from all over Serbia on March 15. Students, together with high school graduates, are travelling on foot and by bicycle to the big protest. While the students and pupils are walking towards Belgrade, an appeal comes from the blockade at the faculty of Organisational Sciences to all citizens of Serbia to “weave threads of support into the great banner of resistance” with their actions.
