

Anti-government protest in Belgrade on February 2. Photo: Jovana Prusina/BIRN.

Serbian police on Monday interrogated two participants at last weekend’s anti-government protests for allegedly carrying a makeshift gallows during the rally in Belgrade on February 2.

A Serbian prosecution spokesperson, Irena Bjelos, told Tanjug news agency that the two men were suspected of “racial or other kind of discrimination” – a crime under article 387 of the Serbian criminal code.

Under this article, inciting hatred or violence based on “race, skin colour, religion, nationality, ethnicity or another personal attribute” is punishable with three months to three years in prison. More serious forms of discrimination are punishable by six months to five years.

The director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Human Rights, YUCOM, Katarina Golubovic, said this legal provision could be applied if political affiliation was taken as a “personal attribute”, but warned of concerns that the law was being applied selectively.

“Do you know how many times we wanted this article [of the criminal code] applied in defence of activists who were beaten and persecuted?” Golubovic asked.

She said that they had wanted attackers prosecuted under article 387 in at least five cases concerning activists who were assaulted for their political views, but the prosecution never applied it.

Prime Minister Ana Brnabic condemned the incident with the gallows, accusing a part of the opposition of not respecting different opinions.

“Gallows have appeared in the streets, showing impotence growing into aggression; this is a lynch policy,” Brnabic told the pro-government TV Pink.

The pro-government tabloid Informer accused supporters of Dragan Djilas, leader of the opposition Alliance for Serbia, of calling for the murder of those who hold different views.

Media reports later that the two men who carried the mock gallows were supporters of the far-right opposition movement Dveri.

Srdjan Nogo, an MP for Dveri in the Serbian parliament, told BIRN that he saw nothing very controversial in the action, and claimed that protesters did the same in other countries.

“Weren’t there gallows [at the protests] in London, and a guillotine in Paris? Didn’t the First Amendment of the US Constitution guarantee freedom of expression when people carrying [President Donald] Trump’s doll set up a gallows in front of the White House?” Nogo asked.