Driver rams anti-government rally in Serbia’s capital and injures one protester
It happened during a student-led strike which shut down businesses and drew tens of thousands of people to demonstrations around the country.
A woman rammed a car into a crowd of anti-government protesters in Serbia’s capital and injured one of them, police said.
It happened on Friday during a student-led strike which shut down businesses and drew tens of thousands of people to demonstrations around the country.
The nationwide protests took place on the same day that President Aleksandar Vucic planned a big afternoon rally in a central town to counter the persistent anti-government protests that have challenged his tight grip on power.
Police in Belgrade said they detained the 24-year-old driver who rammed into a crowd of protesters in a section the city called New Belgrade.
The injured victim, a 26-year-old woman, was taken to an emergency hospital where her condition was not immediately known.
A similar ramming incident took place during a blockade last week in Belgrade, when a car rammed into protesting students, seriously injuring a young woman.
Many in Serbia believe the huge concrete canopy at a train station in the northern city of Novi Sad fell down because of sloppy reconstruction work that resulted from corruption.
Weeks-long protests demanding accountability over the crash have been the biggest since Mr Vucic came to power more than a decade ago.
He has faced accusations of curbing democratic freedoms despite formally seeking European Union membership for Serbia.
It was not immediately possible to determine how many people and companies joined the students’ call for a one-day general strike on Friday.
“Let’s take freedom in our hands,” students told the citizens in their strike call.
Mr Vucic planned to gather his supporters in the central town of Jagodina later on Friday.
He has announced plans to form a nationwide political movement in the style of Russia’s President Vladimir Putin’s United Russia movement to help ensure the dominance of his right-wing Serbian Progressive Party.
The president and the country’s mainstream media have accused the students of working under orders from foreign intelligence services to overthrow the authorities while pro-government thugs have repeatedly attacked protesting citizens.
The 15-minute traffic blockades on Friday started at 11.52am, the exact time of the canopy collapse in Novi Sad.
Serbian universities have been blockaded for two months, along with many schools.
A lawyers’ association has also gone on strike but it remained unclear how many people stayed away from work in the state-run institutions on Friday.
Protests marches were held Friday in Belgrade, Novi Sad, the southern city of Nis and other smaller cities — even in Jagodina, a ruling coalition stronghold, ahead of Mr Vucic’s arrival.
“Things can’t stay the same any more,” actor Goran Susljik told N1 regional television. “Students have offered us the possibility of change.”
Serbia’s prosecutors have filed charges against 13 people for the canopy collapse, including a government minister and several state officials.
But the former construction minister Goran Vesic has been released from detention, fuelling doubts over the probe’s independence.
The main railway station in Novi Sad was renovated twice in recent years as part of a wider infrastructure deal with Chinese state companies.
