1) Protesters, Police Clash As Serbian Regime Fights For Its Life.
2) Seven Protesters Taken To Emergency Room After Police Violence.
3) Serbian Unionists Beaten, Driven Back From Parliament.
4) Unionists Condemn Regime's Brutality, Pledge To Spread Demos
Across Serbia.
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From: Rick Rozoff.
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1)
Agence France-Presse
October 30, 2003.
http://tinyurl.com/t44q

Protesters, police clash as Serbian government battles
in parliament.
Katarina Subasic.

-"Our request is for early elections and the fall of
the government. A government which is not creating an
environment in which you can work and live normally is
no good," union leader Milenko Smiljanic told AFP.
-Unemployment stands at around 30 percent and many
workers are concerned that they will lose their jobs
as the government sells off thousands of communist-era
businesses to private investors.


BELGRADE, Oct 30 (AFP) - Three protesters were injured
Thursday in clashes with Serbian police on the second
day of demonstrations against the government, which is
battling to survive a no-confidence debate in
parliament.

Scuffles broke out as scores of armed riot police
marched on trade unionists who were threatening to
break into the parliament and interrupt the debate, an
AFP reporter at the scene said.

The incident was immediately seized upon by opposition
politicians inside the assembly, where the government
is struggling to avoid early elections amid confusion
about whether it has a majority or not.

Bojan Pajtic, a member of the ruling coalition,
confirmed that three protesters had been hospitalised
in a "minor" scuffle with police.

The workers are demanding early elections and the
resignation of the government in response to sweeping
economic reforms [sic] introduced after the ouster of
former Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic three years
ago.

"Our request is for early elections and the fall of
the government. A government which is not creating an
environment in which you can work and live normally is
no good," union leader Milenko Smiljanic told AFP.

"That's why the workers are on the streets. We've
tried to negotiate with the government 100 times and
we've been tricked 100 times."

Several thousand workers earlier marched to the
parliament in downtown Belgrade to the strains of a
dulcet satirical song condemning the government's
failures.

By late afternoon their numbers had dwindled but their
threats to invade the building apparently prompted the
police action.

Inside the building MPs were debating a no-confidence
motion which could precipitate early elections in what
is seen as the worst political crisis in Serbia since
Milosevic's ouster.

Prime Minister Zoran Zivkovic said economic hardship
was "normal" in a country making the transition from
communism and autocracy, and accused his opponents of
creating the mess in the first place.

"If you thought that we were going to defend ourselves
today and in the days ahead then you were wrong,
because we are honoured to have been part of the
project called the normalisation of the Serbian
state," Zivkovic said.

"If we do not have majority in the parliament, we will
call for elections."

Disunity is rife within the group of 17 parties which
form the ruling DOS coalition and the popular
enthusiasm for change which swept the country as
Milosevic was toppled in October 2000 has all but
evaporated.

The government suffered a heavy blow in March this
year when former prime minister Zoran Djindjic, an
unpopular but highly motivated [indeed] leader, was
assassinated by a mafia sniper.

It has been beset by corruption scandals as well as
increasingly effective attacks from opposition groups
ranging from radical nationalists to liberal
reformers.

Unemployment stands at around 30 percent and many
workers are concerned that they will lose their jobs
as the government sells off thousands of communist-era
businesses to private investors.
-----------------------------------------------------

2)
Beta
October 31, 2003.
http://tinyurl.com/t44t

Seven injured in protests.

BELGRADE -- Thursday ? Seven protesters were admitted
to the Belgrade Emergency Centre with injuries
suffered in today?s clash between union demonstrators
and special police squads.

One woman has been kept in hospital under observation
because of possible complications arriving from her
injuries.

Riot police intervened twice during today?s
demonstrations: first pushing workers back from the
parliament building at about 1.00 p.m. then three
hours later when protesters attempted to break through
a cordon in Kralj Milan Street.
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3)
Beta
October 30, 2003.
http://tinyurl.com/t44x

Police sweep demonstrators from Parliament forecourt.

BELGRADE -- Thursday ? Three demonstrators were taken
to hospital this afternoon after armed police troops
today drove back protesting workers from the front of
the Serbian Parliament building.

The protesters were injured as they were forced a
hundred metres away the building, where they were held
in place by a cordon of police in full riot gear.

Today?s protest began in nearby Nikola Pasic Square
where about two thousand members of the Alliance of
Independent Serbian Unions began a march on the
parliament.

In a scene reminiscent of protests against the
Milosevic regime, riot police used their shields to
force the marchers off their course.

The Otpor people?s movement told media after today?s
clash that their members had seen a protester being
beaten with a wooden baton by plainclothes police.

Union leader Vlada Andric said this afternoon that the
demonstrators, who had earlier broken through a police
cordon, only wanted to meet political leaders and were
not insisting on entering the parliament.

He added that the breach of the cordon had happened
spontaneously.

Alliance president Milenko Smiljanic told media that
he had asked the parliament to take a short recess in
order to allow marchers to pass the building without
violating a law which bans protests outside the
parliament when it is in session.
-----------------------------------------------------

4)
Beta
October 30, 2003.
http://tinyurl.com/t44y

Union lashes out at ?undemocratic behaviour?

BELGRADE -- Thursday ? The Alliance of Independent
Serbian Unions has accused the Serbian authorities of
displaying a lack of democracy in today?s violent
clash between union members and police in front of the
Serbian Parliament building.

Union leader Milenko Smiljanic told journalists that
all parliamentary caucuses had condemned the police
reaction and protested against the brutal break-up of
a peaceful demonstration.

He said that the protest would resume tomorrow, but
would not give details except to say that it would
?extended to the whole of Serbia?.

Smiljanic accused the head of the parliament?s
Security Committee, Dragan Sutanovac, of misleading
MPs about the number of injured protesters and denied
his claim that the workers were drunk and drugged.