Mass anti-corruption protests put strain on close European ally of Russia

Student-led protests pose the gravest threat to Serbian strongman Aleksandar Vucic's 14 years in power, with over 100,000 taking to the streets of Belgrade and cities across Serbia, calling out systemic corruption throughout the government.

March 15 saw what many believe to be the largest crowds in Serbia's recent history, with an estimated 300,000 people marching in the center of Belgrade.  

Serbian President Vucic, who remains close to Russia, has remained defiant, ignoring calls to step down and accusing the protest movement of planning violent attacks and stoking a civil war.

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"Moscow and Belgrade pledged to combat color revolutions together in 2021. This is dangerous as Russia can provide Serbia with intelligence support," Ivana Stradner, research fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, told Fox News Digital.

"Vucic is hoping that protests in Serbia will stop, but they are growing increasingly," Stradner added.

Vucic accused the students of orchestrating a Western-backed "colored revolution" and compared the movement to the 2014 Euromaidan Revolution in Ukraine, when the pro-Russian president of Ukraine was ousted from power for seeking closer ties with Vladimir Putin over Europe.

Nongovernmental and civil society organizations accuse the government of using illegal weapons, including long-range acoustic devices (LRAD), a common crowd control device that can cause severe hearing damage, during a commemorative silence for the victims of the Novi Sad railway collapse in November. 

"The Belgrade Center for Security Policy strongly condemns the unlawful and inhumane deployment of prohibited weapons, such as acoustic devices, against peaceful protesters during a public gathering of hundreds of thousands of citizens paying tribute to victims of the collapsed roof in Novi Sad," the group said in a statement.

Serbia's foreign minister, Marko Djuric, denied the allegations in a post on X.

"Serbia categorically denies the baseless accusations that any illegal weapons, including so-called 'sound cannons,' were used against demonstrators in Belgrade," Djuric said.

President Vucic also denied the claims, calling it "a vile lie" in an address to the nation and promised to investigate the matter.

The protests consuming Serbia didn't just happen overnight and have been sustained for months.

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Tens of thousands of college students have been marching since December, demanding justice and accountability after the deaths of 15 people in the collapse of a railway station in the Serbian town of Novi Sad. The canopy at the railway station collapsed Nov. 1 after renovations led by two Chinese companies.

What originally started as spontaneous protests voicing dissatisfaction with the government's failed response to the railway catastrophe transformed into a movement opposing widespread corruption and the erosion of the rule of law under Vucic.

"It's also important to recognize that the cause of the protests runs deeper - many people perceive the state as corrupt and are broadly dissatisfied with Vučić's government. They are calling for greater press freedom and accountability," Helena Ivanov, senior fellow at the Henry Jackson Institute, told Fox News Digital.

Ivanov said that the government's attempts to mitigate the situation, such as arresting individuals involved in corrupt deals from years ago or the resignation of the prime minister in January, have been seen as too little, too late by the protesters and opposition politicians.

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Many experts and observers of the Balkans were disappointed in the Biden administration's regional policy, claiming that the administration appeased the Vucic regime and refused to call out his antidemocratic practices. The efforts to sway Vucic and maintain close ties to Belgrade were seen as integral to the Serbia-Kosovo normalization process and their path toward European Union ascension. 

A former high-ranking diplomat with expert knowledge of the Balkans told Fox News Digital that Vucic wrongly portrays the protesters as inspired and led by the "globalist elite," hoping to gain the attention and support of President Trump. 

If President Trump wants a quick, cheap win for him and the U.S. in the Balkans, the diplomat said Trump should shift the U.S. regional posture from appeasing Vucic to containing him. Such a posture in Serbia will show that the U.S. is not kidding in the Balkans and wants a peaceful solution to simmering conflicts while utilizing the "peace through strength" doctrine.