Unexpected Escalation

BETAPHOTO/Dragan Gojic

After harsh criticism at the opposition’s expense, that the protest rally it organized in Belgrade on Nov. 11 was aimless and pointless, multiple parliamentary parties have changed their tactics, opting for various forms of civil disobedience. The situation escalated on Nov. 20 when opposition MPs and aldermen blocked the court and prosecutor’s office in Novi Sad for the second day in a row. The gap between the regime and its opponents was additionally widened by events in Belgrade that same day, after the police’s nighttime operation aimed at facilitating the dismantling of the Old Sava Bridge, which activists have been preventing for weeks.