Serbian farmers join striking university students’ traffic blockade in Belgrade

Serbia’s striking university students launched a 24-hour blockade of a key traffic intersection in the capital, Belgrade, on Monday, stepping up pressure on the authorities over a deadly canopy collapse in November that killed 15 people.

Serbian farmers on tractors and thousands of citizens joined the blockade which followed weeks of protests demanding accountability over the deadly accident in the northern city of Novi Sad that critics have blamed on rampant government corruption.

A campaign of street demonstrations has posed the biggest challenge in years to the populist government’s firm grip on power in Serbia.

Serbia’s president, Aleksandar Vucic, at a joint press conference with Prime Minister Milos Vucevic and Parliament Speaker Ana Brnabic, later on Monday urged dialogue with the students, saying “we need to lower the tensions and start talking to each other”.

Students have in the past refused to meet Mr Vucic, saying the president is not entitled by the constitution to hold talks with them.

“Any kind of a crisis poses a serious problem for our economy,” said Mr Vucic. “Such a situation in society is not good for anyone.”

The president has faced accusations of curbing democratic freedoms despite formally seeking European Union membership for Serbia. He has accused the students of working for unspecified foreign powers to oust the government.

Several incidents have marked the street demonstrations in the past weeks, including drivers ramming into the crowds on two occasions, when two young women were injured.

On Monday, traffic police secured the student blockade to help avoid any similar incidents.

Protesting students set up tents at the protest site, which is a key artery for city commuters and towards the main north-south motorway.

Some students played volleyball, others sat down on blankets on the pavement or walked around on a warm day. They also held a daily 15-minute commemoration silence at 11.52, the time when the canopy at a railway station in Novi Sad crashed down on November 1.

Many in Serbia believe the huge concrete canopy fell down because of sloppy reconstruction work that resulted from corruption.

Serbia’s prosecutors have filed charges against 13 people, including a government minister and several state officials. But former construction minister Goran Vesic has been released from detention, fuelling doubts over the investigation’s independence.

The main railway station in Novi Sad had been renovated twice in recent years as part of a wider infrastructure deal with Chinese state companies.