Opposition Urges the EU To Back Serbia’s Citizens, Some Parties Request Sanctions against the Regime

(BETAPHOTO/MILOS MISKOV)

Serbia was now at a turning point of the ongoing major political crisis, triggered by President Aleksandar Vucic, and the EU and its bodies should clearly support Serbia’s citizens and declare Vucic an autocratic leader, representatives of five Serbian opposition parties said in Strasbourg on September 9.

Representatives of the Freedom and Justice Party, the Green-Left Front, the Free Citizens Movement, Serbia Center (SRCE), and the People's Movement of Serbia spoke about the current political situation in Serbia at the panel discussion titled “Serbia: Democracy at a Crossroad.” 

Borko Stefanovic, deputy leader of the Freedom and Justice Party, said he believed that “the European Commission has finally understood the concrete cause of problems in Serbia - the Vucic regime.” The Green-Left Front co-president Biljana Djordjevic said that over the past 13 years, Serbia had moved away from a semi-consolidated democracy and had turned to authoritarianism, adding that Vucic had been portraying the EU as “anti-Serbian”. Free Citizens Movement leader Pavle Grbovic said that the independent institutions in Serbia “have been hijacked, the parliament has become a farce, while the judiciary serves as a partisan instrument”.

Djordjevic said her party and the Free Citizens Movement had demanded a clear condemnation of police brutality and the actions of illegal paramilitary groups, as well as specific sanctions against high-ranking state officials who had supported use of force against protesters. She also said that the two parties had requested sanctions against Vucic, Prime Minister Djuro Macut, Parliament speaker Ana Brnabic, and Interior Minister Ivica Dacic.