Foreign Agencies on December 29th, 1996

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (AP)
...
The police ban applies to the whole of Serbia. Protest marches have been held in 47 towns and cities virtually every day since Milosevic overturned the results of Nov. 17 local elections that candidates of the opposition coalition Zajedno, or Together, had won.

A protest walk by students was planned for later Sunday. On Saturday, riot police prevented students from marching in the city center but there were no violent incidents.

Artists, professionals and the head of the Serbian Orthodox Church added their voices to the welling protest in Yugoslavia, calling for violence to be averted and autocracy defeated.
...
The premier of Montenegro, Serbia's junior partner in the Yugoslav federation, on Saturday expressed solidarity with the protesting students.

``Montenegro has always supported pro-democracy tendencies and is now supporting you,'' Premier Milo Djukanovic said.

Last Tuesday, Milosevic called his own supporters into Belgrade, and at least 58 people were injured in clashes between them and opponents of the Serbian president. Police weighed in on the side of the Milosevic backers.

The students called on Saturday for the resignation of Serbian Interior Minister Zoran Sokolovic, saying that he was ``the most responsible'' for police behavior. In an open letter to the Serbian and Yugoslav interior ministers, 41 Belgrade University law professors protested the police's ``over-reaction'' to protests.
...
The protests pose the biggest challenge to Milosevic since he rose to power nine years ago, and the authoritarian president has seemed intent on crushing them, at the risk of losing international support.

(c) Copyright 1996 The Associated Press

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (AP) -- Tens of thousands of anti-government demonstrators defied a police ban Sunday amid signs that military officials were joining the movement against Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic.
...
The letter read to the crowd was not signed, but said it was written by ``a great number'' of officers from military posts, a military hospital and an elite paratroopers' brigade in six towns: Nis, Serbia's second largest city; Pristina, the capital of Albanian-majority Kosovo province where Milosevic enjoys strong support from the Serb minority; and the towns of Pirot, Vranje, Zajechar and Urosevac.

The letter asked student protesters to warn the opposition coalition not to abuse its authority once it takes power, so that ``we and our dear young students don't have to overthrow you in six months. Don't promise too much.''

The letter called on Gen. Momcilo Perisic, the Yugoslav army chief of staff, to tell Serbians where he and the armed forces stand -- ``with the people, with the young generation, towards the future.''
...
About 5,000 students later gathered near the university and attempted to march, but police prevented them from leaving a pedestrian zone.
...

(c) Copyright 1996 The Associated Press

Back to index of Foreign agencies

Back to the Home Page