Tens of thousands of people gathered in the Serbian capital on Friday for a major rally in support of President Aleksandar Vucic, who is facing an unprecedented uprising against his autocratic rule amid a crisis that caused by two shootings that shocked the country.
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Speaking to a rain-soaked crowd, Vucic criticized the opposition for seeking his resignation for mishandling the crisis and creating divisions within the country. Two shootings in early May left 18 people dead.
Referring to the massive anti-government protests held in recent weeks, Vucic accused opposition politicians of “trying to abuse the tragedy.”
“Politicians will go down in history because they abused the greatest tragedy in the history of our country,” he said. “Those politicians deserve nothing but contempt.”
But Vucic still invited the opposition to dialogue about their demands.
“All this time they had only one desire, to destroy me and destroy the government of Serbia,” he said. “Those politicians are not even interested in children.”
Vucic reiterated that he would step down as leader of his Serbian Progressive Party on Saturday and announced plans to form a new, nationwide movement that would include politicians, prominent intellectuals, artists and others.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he said. “We will defend Serbia together.”
Friday’s rally was somewhat overshadowed by a new crisis in Serbia’s former province of Kosovo, where ethnic Serbs clashed with Kosovo police on Friday and Vucic ordered Serbian troops to be placed on a “higher which is in a state of alert.” Vucic also said he ordered an “urgent” movement of Serbian troops to the border with Kosovo, which declared independence in 2008.
Responding to Vucic’s call for what he called “the biggest rally in the history of Serbia,” his supporters, many wearing identical T-shirts with his image, were bussed into Belgrade from all over the country. in the Balkans as well as neighboring Kosovo and Bosnia.
Organizers said “hundreds of thousands” of participants attended the gathering in front of Serbia’s National Assembly amid rain and thunder that sent many seeking shelter.
Those working in state companies and institutions were told to take a day off from work to attend the rally in front of the parliament building. Others said they were warned they could lose their jobs if they didn’t show up for the buses that started arriving hours before the gathering began.
Serbian officials said the rally promoted “unity and hope” for Serbia.
In three major anti-government protests held earlier this month in the capital, demonstrators demanded Vucic’s ouster as well as the resignation of two senior security officials. They also demanded the withdrawal of broadcasting licenses for two pro-Vucic television stations that promote violence and regularly host convicted war criminals and other crime figures.
Opposition protesters blame Vucic for creating a climate of despair and division in the country that they say indirectly led to the May 3 and May 4 shootings that left 18 people dead and 20 the injured, most of them students who were shot by a 13-year-old schoolmate.
Vucic has strongly denied any responsibility for the shooting, calling the organizers of the opposition protests “vultures” and “hyenas” who want to use tragedies to try to come to power by force and without election.
Analysts believe that by holding the mass rally, Vucic, who has ruled the country for more than a decade with a tight grip on power, is trying to cover up the opposition protests with the large number of participants.
“For the first time, Vucic has a problem,” said political analyst Zoran Gavrilovic. “His problem is not so much the opposition, but the awakened Serbian society.”
Vucic, a former pro-Russia ultranationalist who now says he wants to bring the country into the European Union, accused “foreign intelligence services” of behind the opposition protests. He said he received the tip from “sisterly” spy agencies “from the east” – thought to mean Russia.
Similar large rallies were held in Serbia in the early 1990s when strongman Slobodan Milosevic gave fiery speeches announcing the violent breakup of Yugoslavia and rallying the masses for subsequent wars.
(AP)