SERBIA: Rio Tinto protests & more – 13th Aug 2024

Dobar dan from Keswick Village! This is the Rorshok Serbia Update from the 13th of August twenty twenty-four. A quick summary of what's going down in Serbia.

Last week, Kosovo police closed nine Serbian post offices in the north of Kosovo, to outlaw Belgrade-backed institutions in the area, which is largely Serbian-populated, and to end the use of the Serbian dinar for payments in Kosovo. This comes only two months after the police closed six Serbia-run financial institutions in Kosovo’s north with the same intent. The police explained that they had started the operation after the Regulatory Authority of Electronic and Postal Communications informed them of illegally-run offices in the north of Kosovo.

Serbia, the US, and the EU condemned this operation, with the US and the EU expressing disappointment, and Serbia accusing Kosovo of provoking conflict. Serbian President Vucic called on Brussels to take action against Kosovo, adding that the operation was part of the authorities’ efforts to establish official control over the Serbian-majority Kosovo north. Recall that in February, Kosovo authorities announced the decision to end the use of the Serbian dinar for transactions, which sparked a lot of protests from the Serbian population in Kosovo.

Speaking of protests in Kosovo, on Wednesday the 7th, hundreds of Serbians protested in North Mitrovica due to Kosovo’s government’s decision to open the main bridge in Mitrovica, which divides the mainly Serbian north and Albanian south of the city and has been closed for traffic since nineteen ninety-nine. A former judge in Kosovo said that the security of the Serbian population in the north of Kosovo is at stake, as Serbians and Albanians in Kosovo maintain an unfriendly, sometimes even aggressive, dynamic.

Serbian authorities condemned the reopening of the bridge, accusing Kosovo of trying to provoke conflict. However, Albin Kurti, Kosovo’s prime minister, said the operation aimed to foster peaceful interaction between the two communities.

Over the past few days, thousands of people gathered in several cities to march against lithium mining in the country. Environmental organizations and regular citizens had already held dozens of rallies against Rio Tinto’s Jadar project, which plans to mine lithium and boron in the western town of Jadar. In Novi Sad, the protesters carried banners saying You Won’t Dig and featured several speakers before a protest march.

One of the speakers was a geological engineer, who warned that the Jadar processing plant would take large amounts of drinking water, which he highlighted would be extremely wasteful. In Belgrade, environmental experts noted that the damage the mining would do to the water and land of Jadar would be irreversible.

In some news on the economy, the State Statistical Office has reported that the average salary in Serbia amounted to around 900 dollars in May. President Vucic commented on the news, and compared the numbers with those from a decade ago, concluding that it grew significantly - by around three hundred percent. He also said that his goal is for the average salary to reach more than 1,400 dollars by twenty twenty-seven.

However, the median net salary amounted to around 700 dollars in May, which means that only half of the employees in Serbia earned that amount or less. Aleksa Dokic, from the Faculty of Economics in Belgrade, noted that the differences in median and average salaries indicate that there is a significant number of positive extremes that raise the average salary, but the median figure is lower.

On Thursday the 8th, Serbia’s National Bank announced that they have decided to keep the benchmark interest rate at six percent, pausing monetary easing after two back-to-back quarter-point cuts. They noted that although inflation has dropped to levels within the target band, they still have to be cautious about monetary policies. They said that inflation cooled down to around 4% in June, and added that they expect it to reach around 3% next year.

Still in economy, President Vucic announced last week that the negotiations on a higher minimum wage will start on the 15th of August. In a response, on Monday the 12th, the Association of Free and Independent Unions proposed around 570 dollars a month for a 21-day working month, around 600 dollars a month for a 22-day one, and around 630 dollars for a 23-day working month. Roughly 4% of workers in Serbia earn the minimum wage, which currently stands at around 450 dollars on average.

In other news, officials from the International Trade Union Confederation noted last week that Serbia is one of the few countries that have not yet ratified Convention 190 against workplace violence. The convention, which was adopted in June twenty nineteen, was the first international treaty to recognize the employees’ right to work free from violence and harassment, including gender-based violence and mobbing. For the fourth year in a row, the Independence Trade Union Association called on the government to ratify Convention 190. Along with trade unions, the International Trade Union Confederation officials noted that both public and private sectors need to apply the convention.

Speaking of work, the Office for Dual Education and the National Qualifications Framework has launched two competitions for the allocation of grants in the school year period from twenty twenty-four to twenty twenty-nine, that are worth around 500,000 dollars. One competition is aimed at students enrolled in dual education for in-demand professions and will focus on allocating funds to support them in their education by giving them an extra fifty dollars per month on top of their regular scholarships. The deadline for schools to apply for this competition is the 20th of October. The other competition is focused on supporting employers by subsidizing part of the compensation they pay to dual-education students for work-based learning.

In other news, many citizens and opposition party members have been criticizing the government for falling behind on the deadline for the Tirsova 2 Children’s Hospital construction. Last week, Vucic visited the construction grounds and promised that the project would be completed by spring twenty twenty-seven. However, many pointed out that he previously announced the completion of the project for twenty twenty-two, and then moved the deadline to early twenty twenty-five that same year.

In response to Vucic’s visit to the construction grounds, Mila Popovic, an MP from the Freedom and Justice Party, noted that Vucic should apologize to the country, but mainly to those whose children do not have appropriate accommodations for their treatments. She said that Vucic’s visit to the site was for personal promotion, and added that if he really cared about the health of the children, he would have focused on improving the conditions in the already existing children's hospitals.

On a more positive note, the Astronomical Observatory in Belgrade announced the launch of Mosaic, the first Serbian satellite by the end of twenty twenty-five, with the intention of keeping it in the Earth’s orbit for two to three years. A research associate at the Observatory stated that Mosaic belongs to the class of small satellites, colloquially known as nanosatellites, and will aim to observe the Sun in an X-ray domain. The secondary goal of the project is for the team to master the techniques of launching the satellite into space, so that they can work on constructing even larger spacecrafts in the future.

In other news, on Monday the 12th, crowds gathered outside of the Belgrade City Hall building to welcome the athletes who competed in the twenty twenty-four Olympic Games in Paris. Some of the teams and athletes included Novak Djokovic who won gold, the Taekwondo team who won silver, and the team for men’s basketball who won the bronze medal. The athletes met with the president, and the ceremony included a choir concert. Additionally, the athletes gave speeches, and they all expressed gratitude for receiving such support from the country. For its sixth appearance at the Summer Olympics and with more than a hundred athletes across fifteen sports, Serbia secured three gold, one silver, and one bronze medal.

Aaand that’s it for this week! Thank you for joining us!

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Do daljnjeg, zbogom!