(30 Jan 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Belgrade, Serbia – 30 January 2025
1. Various students marching from Belgrade towards Novi Sad
2. People applauding on the side of the street
3. Various students marching
4. SOUNDBITE (Serbian) Tatiana Gogic, biology student:
”This march is our way to show great support for our colleagues from Novi Sad. We are going with them to the protest and blockade of three bridges in Novi Sad. We want also to show how persistent we are and that we do not plan to stop any time soon unless our demands are fulfilled.”
5. Students marching
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Vasilije Milanovic, technical engineering faculty student:
”We are asking for justice and we are asking for freedom of thought. So, this is just another way of showing how radical we are and how we are not stopping and we are going to pursue this until the end.”
7. Students marching
8. SOUNDBITE (Serbian) Dusan Pavlovic, actor:
”We must not allow ourselves any more to create such a society, in a chaos we live now, in kind of despotism where one man makes decisions for all of us. We did not agree to that, a country must not function like that.”
9. Various students marching
STORYLINE:
Hundreds of Serbian university students on Thursday started an 80-kilometer (50 mile) march toward the northern city of Novi Sad – the latest endeavor in their expanding protest movement over a deadly overhang collapse in November that killed 15 people.
The student march started in the capital Belgrade and will end in two days in Novi Sad, where a massive blockade of the city bridges is planned for Saturday to mark three months since the huge concrete construction at the railway station crashed down on people below on Nov. 1.
“This march is our way to show support for our colleagues from Novi Sad” in their blockades, said Tatjana Gogic, a biology student.
“We want also to show how persistent we are and that we do not plan to stop any time soon unless our demands are fulfilled.”
The student protest has been the biggest in Serbia in years for the first time appearing to seriously challenge the Balkan country’s powerful populist leader Aleksandar Vucic.
Weeks-long protests have already forced the resignation of Serbia’s prime minister Milos Vucevic this week and various concessions from the authorities unused to giving them.
Vasilije Milanovic, a student at Belgrade’s technical engineering faculty said “we are asking for justice and freedom of thought.”
“This is just another way to showing how radical we are and we are not stopping this and we are going to pursue this to the end,” Milanovic added.
The tragedy in Novi Sad has become a flashpoint reflecting wider popular discontent in Serbia with the rule of Vucic’s populist government.
Increasingly authoritarian Vucic has imposed a firm grip on all state institutions and mainstream media in the Balkan nation while facing accusations of stifling democratic freedoms.
Many in Serbia believe that the overhang at the train station collapsed because of a sloppy job during reconstruction, poor oversight and disrespect of safety regulations, all caused by government corruption in major infrastructure projects with Chinese state companies.
AP Video shot by Ivana Bzganovic
===========================================================
Clients are reminded to adhere to all listed restrictions and to check the terms of their licence agreements. For further assistance, please contact the AP Archive on: Tel +44(0)2074827482 Email: info@aparchive.com.
Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AP_Archive
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/APArchives
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/APNews/
You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/cc8b7309b7e54bf9b12e17b79f6ec427
Author: AP Archive
Go to Source
News post in February 4, 2025, 12:04 pm.
Visit Our Sponsor’s:
News Post In – News
