Western Balkans: Appeal for Protection from Repression

Statement from the eight organisations:

Serbia is no longer merely sliding – it is hurtling headlong into a repressive dictatorship. In the name of the fundamental values of democracy and human rights, in the interest of preserving peace in a still-fragile post-conflict region, and for the sake of basic human decency and essential norms of civilisation, we ask you to offer your assistance and protection to the citizens of Serbia.

When the highest representatives of the state brand entire segments of society as Nazis – as the President of Serbia and the Speaker of the Serbian Parliament are now doing, with increasing fervour – you are well aware of where such rhetoric inevitably leads. The regime’s slogan, “Better ćaci than Nazi”*, has been swiftly followed by mass arrests, physical violence against dissenters, and overt attempts at censorship – not only in traditional media, but now on social networks as well. Government representatives have publicly called upon the prosecution service to ban the social media profiles of the Students in Blockade movement. Given our past experience, we fear that the prosecution may very well heed these requests.

Violence as a means of confronting anyone must be unequivocally condemned. However, it is painfully evident that there exists a profound imbalance: in a single evening, eighteen individuals were detained for throwing tin cans and splashing water at a regime propagandist. Meanwhile, no one has been apprehended for the grievous bodily harm sustained by a student activist, who was followed, ambushed, and brutally assaulted. The government’s intention to provoke an incident – which would then be used to justify mass arrests and a frenzied campaign of dehumanisation and intimidation – is all too transparent.

Across Serbia, reports are pouring in of state-inflicted terror: attacks on life and property, acts of intimidation, surveillance, and tailing. A chaos is being manufactured in which the forest of violence obscures every individual tree. A collective psychosis is taking root, in which each person lives in fear of being the next target – for having attended a peaceful protest, for having posted on social media, or for simply lacking the favour of a local power grandee. Words of hatred have now metastasised into deeds.

It is painful to witness just how little Serbia resembles a country aspiring to European Union membership. It is dangerous if you fail to see and respond to the acceleration of this repression. For months we have documented cases of police brutality and acts of violence by unidentified pro-regime supporters. An amputated testicle here, a jaw shattered there; a young woman run down, a journalist beaten; and thousands struck down by something they claim is not a sound cannon – but they do not tell us what it is… And now, all these so-called ‘incidents’ have now unmistakably congealed into a system.

What will you do before it is too late?

* “ćaci” is a derogatory term for students and refers to self-proclaimed students and citizens, including supporters of the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) and a group that calls itself ‘Students 2.0’. During the mass protests in spring 2025, they set up a satirically named “ćaci land” camp in Pionirski park in Belgrade to discredit the protests against the government and supposedly demand the resumption of teaching at universities.