Particularly exposed to police violence, female students are at the forefront of the anti-government protests in Serbia, which have not subsided for nearly ten months.
The French newspaper Le Monde writes about the women under attack by the Serbian regime in a text that we are reprinting here in its entirety.
After 24 hours in custody, Teodora Gardović, a 23-year-old student, walked free from the Palace of Justice in Belgrade on the last Wednesday of August. “They are trying to intimidate us, but it’s not working,” said the petite girl with long brown hair, before confidently adding that “everyone should spend 24 hours in a police station, it’s very educational.” After hugging her loved ones, she immediately promised to return to the protests. “Tea, Tea, Tea,” chanted dozens of supporters gathered in front of the large Yugoslav-era building in the center of the Serbian capital.
Arrested the day before on a bus by plainclothes police officers for, in her own words, merely throwing a “water bottle” at the offices of President Aleksandar Vučić’s Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) during a demonstration, Tea has become one of the emblematic figures of the anti-corruption movement that has been shaking this Balkan country for nearly ten months.
The uprising erupted after the deadly collapse of the railway station canopy in Novi Sad on November 1, 2024, which had just been renovated. The protests soon took on massive proportions, growing into the largest movement since the fall of former dictator Slobodan Milošević in 2000.
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Youth surprising
Tens of thousands of students regularly take to the streets, accusing the state of endemic corruption and holding it responsible for the disaster that killed 16 people. After initially unsuccessfully demanding government transparency and a serious judicial investigation, they have been calling for snap parliamentary elections since May. The students are preparing to present their own list against Vučić, who has won every election since 2014, promising to lead the country toward European Union membership while not renouncing ties with Russia. A striking aspect is that female students have taken a prominent place in the youth movement in a country that is aging and holds traditional values. They regularly lead student movements and are at the front of the columns, trying to prevent the growing violence from the police and the government-sent hooligans who are trying to break up the protests. As the weekly Vreme noted:
“Videos of the protests always show boys and young men in black, with a macho look, in contrast to women of all generations who stand in the front rows.”
The newspaper emphasized that it is precisely the female citizens who are the “key factor of change in our country at this moment.” The female students generally avoid nationalistic and homophobic slogans. They also run the most important Instagram accounts—the main social network used by Serbian students.
“He called me a whore” Teodora’s friend, Nikolina Sinđelić, has also become one of the female faces of the movement.
At 22, she made headlines after being detained on August 14 by an elite unit of the Serbian police during a protest. Nikolina claims she was beaten and that the commander of the unit threatened to rape her.
“He called me a whore and said he would f**k me,” said the short-haired brunette, a journalism and communications student, who filed a criminal complaint against the police on August 26.
“Young women are particularly exposed,” she says while drinking a cappuccino in a Belgrade cafe. Since she publicly spoke out about the police violence, she has been fiercely attacked by the authorities. The Minister of Internal Affairs did not open any investigation but called her a “liar,” while a television station close to the government tried to discredit her by publishing nude photos that a former partner had put out as “revenge pornography.”
Such misogynistic attacks have shocked many feminists in Serbia, who organized protests across the country in a show of support. “By attacking Nikolina, you have declared war on all women,” the collective Women’s Solidarity stated.
Activism with experience “They chose a very bad target, considering her character,” says sociologist Jovan (who does not want to reveal his last name), openly expressing admiration for Nikolina. Despite their youth, both Nikolina and Teodora have years of experience in activism. They participated in protests against the opening of a lithium mine in 2021 and 2022, as well as in protests after the school massacre in 2023. In their opinion, the reason women are so strongly present in this movement lies in the fact that the Serbian university environment is highly feminized. “I am telling you that I am ready to give my life for this country, I am not afraid of your boots,” Nikolina Sinđelić promised on Instagram, a day after her arrest.
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Source: Nova.rs, Foto: ATA Images