Brnabic accuses independent media, opposition of attacking SNS activists

The SNS previously issued a press release saying that Nikola Ristic, an activist of the Svice youth activist group, had “verbally and physically assaulted” SNS activists in the Belgrade neighborhood of Banovo Brdo. However, as usual, Brnabic laid the blame on the opposition and the independent media.

Addressing a media conference at the SNS headquarters in Belgrade on Tuesday, Brnabic said “acts of brutal violence against two female activists, members of the Serbian Progressive Party” took place over the past three days.

“They were attacked by those who keep saying, on a daily basis, that they are fighting against violence for a better, nicer, non-violent, tolerant Serbia,” said Brnabic.

She said that “Nikola Ristic, a Deutsche Welle consultant,” is one of the two people who recorded, “provoked and insulted” SNS activist Jelena Milosavljevic in Banovo Brdo on Sunday.

Brnabic added that SNS activist Slavica Vujacic was attacked on Monday in downtown Belgrade “from behind,” and that Vujacic believes she was attacked because she had a backpack with “Aleksandar Vucic – SNS” written on it.

The outgoing Prime Minister said that the “self-proclaimed social elites assembled around ProGlas and the like, the self-proclaimed political elite Serbia Against Violence and the self-proclaimed media elite assembled around the media outlets owned by tycoon Dragan Solak” are the ones responsible for the attacks.

The Svice activist group said in a post on the X social media network on Sunday evening that they “caught the SNS in the dirty acts of preparing vote theft in Belgrade,” and showed Ristic's video of SNS activists in Banovo Brdo “making a list of where they can register phantom voters” for the repeat Belgrade elections.

The video shows that there was no assault, but only an argument.