Hrka: If Vucic Is Willing to Talk, Let Him Come Here and Do So in Front of Everyone

BETAPHOTO/Miloš Miškov

The mother of youth Stefan Hrka who was killed in the Novi Sad railway station canopy collapse, Dijana Hrka, responded on Nov. 9 to Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic's invitations to talk by saying let him come where she has been on a hunger strike near the building of the Serbian parliament in Belgrade since Nov. 2, and talk to her in front of everyone.

She said she was not thinking about what Vucic's motive was to reach out to her after one year, N1 TV reported. "Let him think about it. He is the president, he has his finger in every pie. If Mr President is willing to talk and if he thinks he wants to talk, he will come here so we can talk in front of all these people, in front of the entire media. If he's afraid of being chanted against, that's his problem, not mine. He brought people here whom he pays, and he's still paying them. They are crooks, they are criminals. And he's hurt? I'm hurt," Hrka said.

She also said that she would ask the Serbian president "why he is afraid of his people, and not afraid to go among felons." She stressed that Vucic had not addressed her directly, but through media outlets -- "his media outlets again."

Nov. 9 was the eighth day of Hrka's hunger strike in the vicinity of the Serbian parliament, where she is staying in a tent on the street and sleeping on pallets after she was not permitted to approach the parliament building when she began her hunger strike. The area in front of parliament is secured by police. Serbian Progressive Party followers have been congregating on parliament's forecourt for days.