{"id":61273,"date":"2014-10-29T12:38:51","date_gmt":"2014-10-29T12:38:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/?p=61273"},"modified":"2017-03-29T11:09:59","modified_gmt":"2017-03-29T10:09:59","slug":"serbia-vucic-lse-media-press","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/?p=61273","title":{"rendered":"Serbian prime minister grilled on press freedom at London event"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Serbian

Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic speaking at LSE (Photo: Milana Knezevic)<\/p><\/div>\n

It wasn\u2019t quite a remote controlled drone carrying a provocative political message, but Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic\u2019s Monday night lecture at the London School of Economics (LSE) came with its own controversial incident.<\/p>\n

“What can you say about the total censorship of all opposition media”, \u00a0Vucic was asked by a young woman in the audience just as the premier sat down for the question and answer portion of the event. She explained that she was representing Nikola Sandulovic, an opposition politician from the Serbian Republican Party, who was sitting beside her. Sandulovic said later he had travelled to London to confront Vucic.<\/p>\n

Chaos ensued. Sandulovic claimed, among other things, that a police officer connected to Vucic had threatened to kill him and that he had evidence contained on\u00a0a CD\u00a0he held\u00a0aloft. Vucic hit back that the Republican Party had only 0.01% of public support, and disputed Sandulovic’s assertion that he had been an adviser to former Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic, who was assassinated in 2003. Accusations flew across the room until LSE\u2019s moderator James Ker-Lindsay finally managed regain control of the situation.<\/p>\n

After the event, Sandulovic told Index he came to London because the media in Serbia ignore him and his party, apart from when government-friendly outlets attack him.<\/p>\n

That press freedom was a popular topic on the night did not comes as a surprise. Serbia has seen a string of censorship incidents during Vucic\u2019s time in\u00a0power, as Index and many others have reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The prime minister himself brought up the press in his introductory lecture. He explained how his government has passed several new laws aimed at improving the media landscape, and complained that despite this, they are \u201cscapegoated\u201d. He directly addressed the recent controversial\u00a0cancellation of a political talk show, Utisak Nedelje<\/a>\u00a0(Impressions of the Week), saying authorities have been subjected to a blame campaign for what was a commercial decision. Supporters of the show, including host Olja Beckovic, say it was down to political pressure.<\/p>\n

In a joking reference to his infamous role under Slobodan Milosevic, he said he had been the \u201cworst minister of information\u201d. Curiously, he also used this former job as a counterargument to critics, arguing that\u00a0his past had made it easy to blame him for any instance of censorship.<\/p>\n

But this didn\u2019t seem to stop the press-related questions, though none of the journalists present were chosen to ask one. Apart from the memorable Sandulovic intervention, an audience-member pointed out that Utisak Nedelje wasn’t\u00a0the only show to have been taken off air in recent times.<\/p>\n

If there was an overarching theme to the night, it was that it seemed to showcase different\u00a0—\u00a0some would say conflicting\u00a0—\u00a0sides of Vucic and his administration. He reminded the audience\u00a0that Belgrade had recently organised a successful Pride parade, before adding that he didn\u2019t want to attend. To have that choice, he argued, was a real mark of freedom.<\/p>\n

There were, of course, questions about the football drone<\/a>. While Vucic said he didn\u2019t want to share his own views, he said UEFA (European football\u2019s governing body) saw Serbia\u2019s side of the story by awarding them the win, before pointing out that Serbia carries its share of the responsibility. The planned state visit from Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama — the first in 68 years — will go ahead, he also confirmed, despite the post-drone postponement<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In response to\u00a0questions about relations with Russia — just weeks after the Belgrade military parade<\/a> where Vladimir Putin was the\u00a0guest of honour — he said the two countries would continue to build their relationship, but that this would have no impact\u00a0on Serbia’s ultimate goal of European Union accession.<\/p>\n

Much has been made of Vucic\u2019s apparent journey from Milosevic man to EU enthusiast<\/a>. He seemed to reference this as he said\u00a0he is “not perfect” and that he works \u201cevery single day\u201d to change and better himself. But on Monday, he\u00a0left more questions than answers about the direction he is taking Serbia in.<\/p>\n

Mapping Media Violations<\/a> in Europe: Serbia<\/a><\/p>\n

\"serbia-map10292014\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Five media outlets targeted with DDoS attacks<\/a><\/p>\n

Protesters criticise cancellation of political talk shows<\/a><\/p>\n

Deputy mayor fined for insulting journalist<\/a><\/p>\n

Macedonian journalist released from extradition detention<\/a><\/p>\n

Photographer injured by anti-pride parade protesters<\/a><\/p>\n

This article was originally posted on 29 October at indexoncensorship.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Controversy surrounded Aleksandar Vucic\u2019s Monday night lecture at the London School of Economics <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":259,"featured_media":61289,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[4059,581,113],"tags":[6265,6783,5627,208,727,7370],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61273"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/259"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=61273"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61273\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87188,"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61273\/revisions\/87188"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/61289"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=61273"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=61273"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=61273"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}