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Students Protest 96/97 ODDU
Independent Student Organization
To the Presidency of the European Union
Drs. W. Kok, Prime-minister of the Netherlands
The Hague
Belgrade, 5 February 1997
Dear Mr. Prime-minister,
We represent students of Serbia, and do appreciate very much the close
attention of the Dutch government, the European Union and the whole
international community, given to the post-electoral events in Serbia.
After years of war, constant repression, political and economic crises and
outrageous totalitarian dictatorship of the present Serbian powerholders, a
civic spirit and desire for democratic changes in our society finally took
the opportunity to raise its voice against the violation of basic human
rights.
The present situation in Serbia - usage of armed police forces, water
cannons and teargas, beating up peaceful citizens in the streets of all
major cities, spread of violence and intolerance - has forced us to speak
out openly and appeal to the European Union and the whole international
community to increase their pressure against the non-democratic regime in
Belgrade.
We request from national governments, the European Union and the
international community:
- to use all means to force the Serbian authorities to fully accept and
act by the OSCE report regarding the local elections held on 17th of
November, 1996, and to refrain from further use of violence against
peaceful demonstrators. Facing parliamentary and presidential elections
later on this year, we ask the OSCE to send monitors to Serbia, right from
the beginning of the election campaign, in order to check whether the
elections can and will be fair and free.
- to pressure the Serbian regime to solve the media-problem as soon as
possible and before the upcoming election campaign, by reforming the
existing state-owned electronic media and press, and by supporting the
independent media and independent media-projects throughout the country.
- to put pressure on the Serbian government to drop the existing
University Law, in order to enable democratic changes to take place at the
universities in Serbia, as well as a reform of the educational system. A
special visit to Serbia of the ministers of education of the so-called
EU-Troika should serve this purpose.
- to recognize the new student and civic movements in Serbia being of
fundamental importance for the emergence of a strong civil society, and to
support them through different projects and concrete actions.
- to isolate internationally persons from the ruling structures, who
disregard democratic rules and international laws. This especially applies
to president Milosevic and his closest circle. This isolation should not
affect the life of ordinary citizens from Serbia.
We sincerely hope that Europe and the international community will become
more aware of the importance of emerging democratic civic and student
movements in the Balkans. With your support, we want to be able to continue
our struggle for an open society and a full democracy.
Belgrade, February 5th ,1997
The members of the student delegation:
Uros Bobic
Students Protest 96/97
Dimitrija Koturovica 42
Belgrado
Danilo Drndarski
ODDU
Moravska 16
Pancevo
Aleksandar Jankovic
Independent Student Organization
Brace Jerkovic 163
Belgrado
Goran Pavlovic
Students Protest 96/97
Dorda Miladinovica 14
Cacak
Notes
- More than 75 days passed since the outbreak of protests in Belgrade.
They were caused by the abuse of power and disrespect of electoral law by
the Serbian authorities. Since the 18th of November 1996, an incredible
amount of peacefully expressed, positive energy, creativity and democratic
behavior towards all kind of problems, as well as a strong desire for
immediate change of an autocratic, closed-minded dictatorial regime has
been shown by the demonstrations.
On the one hand, police violence is being used more and more often in the
streets of Belgrade and other cities. The police is breaking into
University buildings (whose autonomy is protected by law). The repressive
behavior of president Milosevic, ministers in the Government of Serbia and
local authorities is still going on. And the unbelievable negative
influence of state-owned media on public opinion in Serbia can be faced day
after day. On the other hand, there is a positive and promising democratic
atmosphere noticeable among the citizens of Serbia, creating a clear
contrast.
- We invite all countries in the EU and the international community to
force the Serbian authorities, by all means, to obey the OSCE report and
the European Parliament resolution, and to accept the electoral results
from November 17th. After that, the liberation of state-owned media and a
dialogue of political parties on the Serbian scene could start. We find it
necessary too, that the OSCE should monitor the republic and presidential
elections in Serbia that will be held in the course of 1997.
- We understand that the international community is rather concerned
regarding the guarantees for the Dayton peace agreement, after a possible
resignation of president Milosevic. Our opinion is that president Milosevic
himself, as one of the persons who played a crucial role in starting the
war in former Yugoslavia, can not present a real guarantee for peace in the
Balkans. We find the new democratic atmosphere, created by the emerging
civic movements in Serbia, the only real guarantee against any war on these
territories. No matter what party will present the state of Serbia and
Yugoslavia in the future, more than ten million citizens of Yugoslavia did
feel that the world respects their desire for democratic changes They will
form a much better guarantee for peace than just one single person - the
present president of Serbia, who has lost almost all support from the
people of Serbia.
(We have already made a number of contacts with students from surrounding
countries - Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Albania- as well as with students
from Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia. We look forward to further dialogue and
cooperation within the region, as it is a highly important step to
European integration in the future.
- A complete reform of the existing University Law (it was issued by the
Serbian Parliament with the Socialist Party in majority, after the Student
Protest in 1992) is a precondition for further progress and development of
student activities and the establishment of a modern educational system in
our country. It would enable the formation of various independent student
organizations and associations (some of them already existing illegally,
while some others were formally registered but practically forbidden),
which is now prohibited by the law. Those organizations would link the
students in Serbia with other similar organizations in the world and with
their colleagues from European countries. They would embark on a variety
of projects, on student exchanges, scholarships, investing in modern
university literature and educational programs. They would also protect the
development of a democratic atmosphere among the students, renew the
student life at all Serbian universities and transform the energy of the
existing Student Protest into a real student movement - a new democratic
force in Serbian society;
- The isolation, including economic sanctions, against the representatives
of the Belgrade regime and in particularly `the royal Milosevic family`
should comprise a blockade of personal bank accounts outside the country,
the failure to issue visas for EU countries to persons closely related to
the ruling structures in Serbia, up to a pulling out of the ambassadors
from Belgrade.
These sanctions should in no way harm ordinary citizens of Serbia. It was
shown during the time of the UN sanctions, that the existing blockade did
not affect the authorities at all, and that the main parts of society
suffering from the sanctions were the lower and middle classes, while
several thousands of higher-class representatives got even stronger and
more powerful in Serbia. These sanctions were strengthening the Milosevic`
regime!
- The democratization of the Serbian society and the process of opening up
towards Europe and the world should result in a more liberal visa policy
for the citizens of Serbia (the visa policy was, besides the outrageous
role of the state-owned media, one of the main reasons why the xenophobic
atmosphere spreaded throughout the country successfully during the past
couple of years), better connections with economic, cultural and academic
institutions and the possibility for cooperation in a number of projects
that would bring the new Serbia closer to the modern world.
- The media problem remains the main problem in Serbia. We find it
absolutely necessary that the EU and international community support the
independent radio and TV stations, especially outside Belgrade, in the
so-called `free cities` where the opposition won the local elections. Also,
the B92 and Index radios in Belgrade proved to be the only objective
support for the democratic forces and peaceful protests until now.
Therefore, their demands for support should be considered with great
attention.
- Many faculties of the Belgrade University and the University of Arts,
the Universities of Novi Sad, Subotica, Kragujevac and Nis have started
their own newspaper project. Some of them are printed daily in the form of
bulletin, some are issued weekly, or twice a month, all since the beginning
of the Student protest. Before the outbreak of the Protest, such activities
as publishing a student newspaper, were completely impossible at most of
the faculties. Many students are willing to continue publishing magazines
and bulletins after the Protest is over, and it is very important to
support each of these projects separately because by doing so the students
will remain informed and stay alert after the political situation is
cleared out.
- The students and professors of the University of Arts in Belgrade have
prepared a project for a new, student-run radio station. (NB: Radio Index,
formally the University-owned radio, did not receive a single dinar of help
either from the state or from the University, and it will probably be
transformed into an independent radiostation decoupled from the
University.) In the beginning, this new student-run station would broadcast
its program on the territory of Belgrade, while in the future its signal
might reach Nis, Kragujevac, Pristina and other university centers in
Serbia. After a change of the University Law, it should become rather easy
to obtain a legal frequency for such a radio-station, which is now
absolutely impossible. With quick, objective and independent informative
editorials, modern educational programs and shows, urban multicultural
approaches and pro-European orientations, such a `student-run media`
project would surely play an important roles in the student community of
Serbia and the whole society.
- We would really appreciate being informed about the possibilities for
starting projects among a variety of student unions and associations, as
well as student media projects under the protectorate of EU, and about
concrete financial and other support that EU could offer.
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