YUGOSLAVIA: About 8,000 gather in Kraljjevo to attend anti-government rally organised by the alliance

Record ID: 214831

  • Title: YUGOSLAVIA: About 8,000 gather in Kraljjevo to attend anti-government rally organised by the alliance
  • Date: 16th July 1999
  • Summary: SCU (SOUNDBITE) (Serb-Croat) UNIDENTIFIED MAN SAYS "I came here to support changes." SCU (SOUNDBITE (Serb0-Croat) UNIDENTIFIED MAN SAYS "I came here to support anybody who can replace Milosevic. That is the Allience for Change." SCU (SOUNDBITE (Serbian) UNIDENTIFED WOMAN SAYS "I hope that finally something good will happen here. That we will have some changes soon. That
  • Embargoed: 31st July 1999 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: KRALJEVO, YUGOSLAVIA
  • Country: Serbia
  • Topics: Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVABPIWWK6SQI8O3A4ZQLBGJ53HK
  • Story Text: About 8,000 people gathered on Friday (July 16) in the town of Kraljevo to attend anti-government rally, organised by The Alliance for Change.
    There are only two sides, on one side are them and on the other are the people," Zoran Djindic, leader of the opposition Democratic Party, told the rally in Kraljevo, about 120 km (80 miles) south of Belgrade in central Serbia.
    "Milosevic has nowhere to run," he said.
    As the rally went on, what was thought to be a police camera could be seen poking thrpughh a curtain apparenty recording events.
    Elsewhere, four more town councils in Serbia passed resolutions calling on Milosevic to resign, bringing the total number to do so to 11, the independent Beta news agency said.
    A 12th day of protest was held in Leskovac, south of Nis, where 1,000 people gathered to demand Milosevic's resignation and call for the release of protesters jailed for vandalism after they smashed windows in the house of the local mayor.
    Rallies were also held in Sremska Mitrovica in Serbia's northern Vojvodina province and in Vranje, in the south about 30 km (20 miles) from the Macedonian border, where a local artist began leading people on to the streets last week.
    The opposition is hoping the protests will gather enough momentum by the end of the month for a march on the capital.
    "The Alliance for Change will come to Belgrade together with the people so the bad smell will not spread through Serbia any more," Vladan Batic, coordinator of the opposition grouping, said in Kraljevo at the latest of its now-regular rallies.
    The local television said there were 13,000 refugees from Kosovo in the town, who fled fearing ethnic Albanian revenge for the Serb campaign of terror they say was conducted against them in the months before the troops came in.
    Now they have nowhere to go and their disgruntlement is fuelling discontent, although so far the rallies are confined to the provinces while the capital is largely protest-free.
    "As long as Belgrade does not go out onto the streets nothing will happen," said a woman in her mid-30s, who said she and her husband were refugees from the Kosovo capital Pristina.
    The authorities have not tried to stop the rallies, but people travelling to them are often held up by police and a signature campaign against the country have found their tables turned over by thugs.
    Two unknown men attacked a trade union activist in Belgrade collecting signatures for Milosevic's resignation.In Vranje, police detained Democratic Party official Dragan Janjic and stopped people collecting signatures on the streets, Beta said.
    In Bor, in eastern Serbia, police also stopped the petitions.
    Borislav Novakovic, a senior figure in the Democratic Party, said police had harassed its activists on a daily basis by constantly checking their identity papers.But he said the signing campaign was proceeding apace.
    "In the whole of Serbia, there have been 270,000 signatures," Beta quoted him as saying.
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