Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free
Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.
Serbia’s Prime Minister Miloš Vučević has resigned following weeks of mass protests over a fatal accident at a railway station in the north of the country that has been blamed on government corruption.
The demonstrations were triggered by the collapse of the railway station roof in Novi Sad, Serbia’s second-largest city, on November 1, killing 15 people. The public backlash over the disaster has turned into the biggest challenge to strongman President Aleksandar Vučić’s tight grip on power, who has been in office since 2017.
The roof collapsed following renovations to the station by a consortium led by two Chinese companies that are also building a railway line between Budapest and Belgrade. Vučević, a close ally of the president, was mayor of Novi Sad when the construction work started.
The flagship railway project has been touted by Vučić and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán as emblematic of their openness to more Chinese investment in their countries.
The nationwide protests have been led by students demanding government accountability for the station disaster. They have occupied dozens of universities for the past two months as part of their action. On Friday, tens of thousands of people took part in a general strike in support of the student movement.
On Monday, farmers joined the demonstrations, blocking streets in the capital. With the protests swelling, Vučić appeared at a late-evening press conference with his premier to appeal for dialogue with student leaders, saying “we need to lower the tensions and start talking to each other”.
“Any kind of a crisis poses a serious problem for our economy. Such a situation in society is not good for anyone,” the president added.
Vučić also said he was ready to replace half of the government.
On Tuesday, Vučević said he and his successor as Novi Sad mayor, Milan Đurić, would step down, saying they there were answering the protesters’ demand for government accountability for the accident.
“The mayor of Novi Sad and I consider ourselves objectively responsible for what happened in Novi Sad and for that we are willingly paying the political price,” Vučević said.
Prosecutors have indicted 13 people in connection with the station roof collapse, including a former transport minister. But student leaders have also demanded full transparency of the investigation, with the publication of seized documents.
The protests have been increasingly angry following the arrest of some demonstrators and clashes with supporters of Vučić’s Serbian Progressive party. The president on Monday offered a full amnesty for arrested students in an attempt to quell the protests.
Read the full article here
