SERBIA: Tour de Strasbourg & more – 22nd April 2025

Dobar dan from Keswick Village! This is the Rorshok Serbia Update from the 22nd of April twenty twenty-five. A quick summary of what's going down in Serbia.

On Wednesday the 16th, protesting students from Serbia ended their thirteen-day-long cycling Tour de Strasbourg upon their arrival in the French city. In our previous show, we mentioned that eighty students embarked on a cycling trip of around 1,400 kilometers, or 900 miles, without a day of rest, in order to meet with European Parliament members and tell them about the current political situation in Serbia.

More than a thousand people welcomed the cyclists, including two MEPs who pledged to bring the students’ demands before the European Parliament. Students prepared letters for the Parliament describing what exactly had happened since the canopy collapse tragedy in the northern city of Novi Sad that killed sixteen people. The letters describe the violence students suffered, and the corruption and media darkness in the country, adding that state officials haven’t taken accountability for the tragedy.

In fact, the construction company Starting, which carried out the renovation of the Novi Sad railway station in July of last year, has sued the attorney of Dijana Hrka, the mother of one of the victims. Last week, Starting filed six lawsuits, and the mother of one of the victims, said that she might be one of the targets. Dijana Hrka is an avid supporter of the student-led protests that demand a resolution for the canopy collapse tragedy, so she was a target of the regime supporters. She said that she could very well be one of the people sued on Starting’s list, since she has found out and exposed certain company details, such as the fact that Starting belongs to a government official.

Students and other activists, as well as opposition politicians, condemned the lawsuit, noting that instead of taking accountability for the death of sixteen people, Starting chose to cause additional stress to the family of the deceased.

Meanwhile, the rest of the students back in Serbia started a mission to block the state-owned Radio Television of Serbia, or RTS. The action began late at night on Tuesday, the 15th, when students in Belgrade blocked the two premises of the RTS headquarters, demanding that officials announce a new contest to choose the board of the regulatory body for electronic media, REM. They said that since the student-led protest began, the RTS has failed to fairly represent the political situation, favoring the ruling Serbian Progressive Party or SNS, and featuring smear campaigns against students.

The students highlighted that the current REM board is not regulating what media outlets broadcast, referring to the RTS’s selective reporting, and are calling for a new set of REM members or for the RTS to shut itself down.

Still on the topic of protests, on Wednesday, the 16th, students from the central city of Kraljevo organized a large demonstration - one in a series of many student-led protests since the Novi Sad train station tragedy. Aside from students, the protest saw great support from citizens from all over Serbia, including army veterans, professors, and Serbian biker organizations.

During the main event, students read out their demands. They include the publishing of the entire documentation related to the faulty railway station’s renovation, the prosecution of those who have assaulted students during protests, and the cancellation of all charges against protesting students.

On Friday the 18th, police brought in Vladan Djokic, Belgrade University’s rector, for questioning in a pre-investigation procedure for allegedly abusing his position. Djokic has been vocal about his support for the student-led protests, which have prompted the ruling officials to accuse him of abusing his position by enabling the blockades.

President Vucic and his allies in the SNS have called for Djokic’s arrest on multiple occasions. However, they didn’t have any evidence to back up their call for his detention. During the questioning, students and citizens in Belgrade gathered in front of the police station to voice support for the rector. After the questioning, Djokic said that he denied abusing his position.

Since we mentioned president Vucic, he is planning on attending a military parade in Moscow commemorating the defeat of Nazi Germany in early May, with Serbian military personnel participating in the event. However, the EU condemned the trip, noting that Serbia’s participation in Russian events would hinder its path to EU accession. They explained that the EU has been trying to isolate Russia diplomatically over its invasion of Ukraine, adding that Serbia will have to say goodbye to its membership expectations if it aligns itself politically with Russia.

Russia has since condemned the EU's remarks.

Speaking of the EU, their recent foreign policy decision regarding the situation in Belarus and Minsk's involvement in the Russian aggression against Ukraine has gained support from all EU candidate countries except Serbia. The EU published a list on Wednesday, the 16th, that included persons, entities, and bodies it intends to sanction due to their involvement in the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Serbia didn’t support the policy because of its friendly relations with Belarus. Moreover, Serbia has still not sanctioned Russia in any way for its aggression against Ukraine, despite the EU’s calls.

On that note about Russia, the investigative news outlet iStories reported on Wednesday the 16th that Russian citizens with links to Russia’s defense industry and intelligence services often use Serbian passports to circumvent EU sanctions and travel to EU countries. iStories cited government data and said that the authorities in Serbia have issued more than 200 passports to Russians linked to Russia’s intelligence since the beginning of the invasion of Ukraine. With a Serbian passport, Russians can gain access to visa-free travel within the EU. Additionally, the former head of Transparency International Russia said that the mass passport issuance could be part of a covert Moscow-Belgrade arrangement in exchange for money.

In other news, Kosovo’s Basic Court started a trial on Thursday the 17th for the September twenty twenty-three attack in the Kosovo village of Banjska, where a group of forty Serbians blocked a bridge. After police intervention, they entered an armed conflict, which killed a Kosovo police officer.

The prosecution says that the Serbians who organized and carried out the attack were not ordinary men but a well-trained group. So far, only three men have been arrested in connection with the case. The court is accusing them of terrorism and endangering the constitutional order of Kosovo.

Shifting gears to the economy, the state’s statistical office published the twenty twenty-four economic trends last week, saying that on average, monthly expenses in households were higher than earnings by around 500 dinars, which is around five dollars. Compared to twenty twenty-three, household income increased by eleven percent, while the expenses rose by a little over eleven percent.

The report said that at the top of a household’s monthly expenses are basic necessities, such as food, electricity and housing costs.

The statistical office also said that citizens do not consider culture, recreation and healthcare a priority, since they make up only five percent of a Serbian household’s expenses.

In environmental news, the opposition Democratic party called out the Ministry of Construction, Transport and Infrastructure on Saturday the 19th for their improper work. Danijela Radovanovic, the party’s commissioner, said that the ministry issued a building permit to a cement plant to build a waste incinerator in the village of Kosjeric, but has failed to assess the incinerator’s environmental impact.

Radovanovic said that such a practice not only breaks several environmental laws, but it also fails to inform the citizens of Kosjeric about potential dangers to their health, since waste incinerators pose risks of air and water pollution.

The Democratic Party called for the ministry to halt the project, as well as for independent investigators to determine the legality of the ministry’s issuance of the permit.

And to wrap up this edition, Belgrade’s Sava Center will host one of the most popular musicals, The Phantom of the Opera, for a week starting Tuesday, the 22nd. The show will feature a live orchestra, a cast and crew of more than a hundred members, and many costumes.

For more information about the event, check out the link in the show notes!

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

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Do daljnjeg, zbogom!