Belgrade, April 3, 2025
Violation of basic human rights in Serbia
March 21 – April 3, 2025
Professors and teachers who support the student blockades are under great pressure from the authorities and suffer numerous negative consequences for expressing their opinion publicly. Their February salaries were drastically reduced, but the pressure does not end there. Now state officials and pro-government media are openly calling for the arrest of the Belgrade rector and are targeting faculty and school professors on a daily basis. In the midst of a tabloid and official targeting campaign, the dean from Niš was physically attacked. A female police officer attacked her with a knife, and the fact that high-ranking government officials, starting with the president of the country, tried to relativize this violent act towards the dean, whom the president himself, just a few days before the attack, called a “criminal”.
At the same time, attacks continue on students and citizens who protest, as well as journalists who report objectively. Students in Čačak were attacked by a group of about 20 people, and students in Novi Sad were beaten with belts by a group of 10 men.
In recent weeks, there has been an increase in the number of students and citizens who have been detained or invited to informational interviews. The first criminal complaint was also filed against a group of students from one faculty in the blockade.
For more information about these and other cases recorded in the previous period, see the full report below: