Bosnian students rally for justice, drawing inspiration from anti-graft struggle in Serbia

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) — Students in Bosnia and Montenegro rallied against corruption Monday, drawing inspiration from their fellow students in neighboring Serbia whose anti-graft protests have shaken the government and given rise to calls for political change across the region.

In the Bosnian capital, Sarajevo, students demanded answers over the deaths of 29 people last October, when torrential floods triggered a landslide of rubble from a quarry that was reportedly built illegally.

In Montenegro, which borders both Bosnia and Serbia, students are seeking the removal of top security officials over two separate mass shootings in less than three years when gunmen killed 23 people, including children.

Student-led strikes and blockades of roads and bridges have paralyzed Serbia following the collapse on Nov. 1 of a railway station canopy that killed 15 people, which critics blamed on government corruption in awarding construction contracts.

Serbia, Bosnia and Montenegro were once part of the former Yugoslavia, which broke apart in the 1990s in a devastating series of wars. The new wave of student solidarity illustrates shared grievances in the Balkan nations plagued by graft and complaints of incompetence and mismanagement.

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All three countries are seeking European Union entry but have been slow to enact the required reforms.

“As we can see in Serbia, the protests there are effective because they are massive. Other people are joining the students and they are persistent,” said Sarajevo student Sumeja Durakovic.

Gatherings in two other former Yugoslav states, Croatia and Slovenia, have expressed support for the Serbian students. There have also been demonstrations in cities with large populations from the former Yugoslavia, including in the U.S., Canada, Australia and the European Union.

The Serbian protests that were ignited by the canopy collapse in the northern city of Novi Sad have swelled into rage and demands for change that have challenged populist President Aleksandar Vucic, who has ruled Serbia with a tight grip for more than a decade.

In Sarajevo, students held banners reading “Crime without punishment” and chanted “We won’t stop!” as they demanded that those who failed to prevent the disastrous landslide should be held criminally responsible.

“They weren’t killed by the rain or rocks, but by the negligence of the authorities and institutions, which had not acted preventively and with responsibility toward our lives, our homes, the nature,” the students said in a statement.

“Four months have passed and no one was held accountable for the deaths of 29 of our fellow-citizens,” they added.

In Montenegro, one of the protest organizers, Milo Perovic, said it was important to follow the “waves of boldness” coming from Serbia.

A mass shooting on New Year’s Day left 13 people dead before the attacker killed himself. It left Montenegrins asking why no action was taken after the first fatal shooting in 2022, which claimed 10 lives, among them two children. The gunman was eventually killed by a passerby.

Protests in Montenegro include daily silent blockades lasting 23 minutes to commemorate the shooting victims, just as the Serbian students honor the 15 victims of the canopy fall with 15 minutes of silence each day.

In Sarajevo, Lamija Fuka said she believed that “we, the students, can get together and change the society and our corrupt system ... put an end to all of this.”

The time is right, she added, “to wake up and for young people to finally react to what (political leaders) have been doing to us for the past 30 years.”

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Associated Press writers Jovana Gec in Serbia, and Predrag Milic in Montenegro contributed to this report.