SERBIA / MONTENEGRO: On 5th anniversary of street protests that ousted Slobodan Milosevic, Serbians look forward to eventual accession to the European Union

Record ID: 858709

  • Title: SERBIA / MONTENEGRO: On 5th anniversary of street protests that ousted Slobodan Milosevic, Serbians look forward to eventual accession to the European Union
  • Date: 6th October 2005
  • Summary: (EU) BELGRADE, SERBIAMONTENEGRO (FILE - OCTOBER 5, 2000) (REUTERS) PROTESTERS IN FRONT OF BURNING PARLIAMENT BUILDING POLICE CARS ON FIRE, PARLIAMENT BUILDING ON FIRE HELICOPTER IN SKY
  • Embargoed: 21st October 2005 13:00
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  • Topics: European Union,Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVADVMKDN77KQY1L2HGIP6MMBGE2
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  • Story Text: Regret for lost time and fear of the future marked the anniversary on Wednesday (October 5) of the Serbian street revolt that toppled Slobodan Milosevic in October 2000. There was no flag-waving for the day when thousands stormed parliament after days of strikes, forcing autocrat Milosevic to concede his election defeat at the hands of Vojislav Kostunica. The talk then was of revolution, liberation and a new dawn for a nation that had been isolated for a decade as villain of the bloody wars that marked the breakup of Yugoslavia. "Milosevic was afraid of us. We were afraid of the army and the police," said Serb President Boris Tadic, then an opposition backbencher. "The police were afraid of the army, the army was afraid of the police. With fear everywhere, and at the same time courage everywhere, October 5th came about."
    Describing the scene on the day of the protests, the former head of special police, Goran Radosavljevic, said, "There were hundreds of thousands of people in this square here. I had an order to try to drop the tear gas from the helicopter, because there was no other way to approach (the area). However, it was clear what it would be useless at that moment, when everything was finished."
    Serbia returned slowly to the international fold after Milosevic was ousted. Accepted back into the United Nations and international financial bodies, the country is due to start the long European Union membership process next week. Serbs believe that had it not been for Milosevic, extreme nationalism and wars, their country could have been an EU member state far sooner than former Soviet satellites. But their Oct. 5 "revolution" was far from complete. Just 30 months later, Serbia's first post-communist prime minister Zoran Djindjic, the man who extradited Milosevic to the Hague war crimes tribunal, was assassinated.
    The current government is a fragile coalition of moderate nationalists, royalists and pro-Western technocrats which relies on Milosevic's weakened Socialists for support in parliament. The ultranationalist Radicals, espousing a mix of populist and fascist ideology directed against Western interference, are now Serbia's strongest party. They oppose cooperating with The Hague and seek to block International Monetary Fund reforms. The economy bears the brunt of this uncertainty. Growth rates are strong, but a reputation for graft, murky privatisations, watered down reforms and red tape has kept major foreign investors away.
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