BELGRADE, Serbia (AP) – Serbian government officials brushed off criticism from the opposition over their handling of two mass shootings in the Balkan country earlier this month, even as thousands of people are expected to demonstrate on Friday for the third time this month to demand resignations and other measures. following the murders.
Prime Minister Ana Brnabic and other government officials attended a parliamentary session on Friday focused on the May 3-4 shootings and opposition demands to replace the interior minister and intelligence chief after the carnage that left 18 dead, many of them children.
The two shootings shocked the Balkan nation, especially since the first occurred at an elementary school in central Belgrade when a 13-year-old boy grabbed his father’s gun and opened fire on his classmates. Eight students and a school guard were killed and seven others were injured. Another girl later died in hospital from head injuries.
A day later, a 20-year-old man used an automatic weapon to randomly target people he came across in two villages south of Belgrade, killing eight people and injuring 14.
Brnabic rejected any responsibility of populist authorities for the shootings and accused the opposition of fueling violence in society and threatening populist President Aleksandar Vucic. Brnabic called the opposition-led protests against the violence “purely political” and intended to oust Vucic and the government by force.
“You are the core of the spiral of violence in this society,” Brnabic told opposition lawmakers. “You’re spewing hate.”
The protest planned for Friday evening in front of the Parliament building is the third since the shootings, drawing tens of thousands of people calling for the resignation of government ministers and the withdrawal of the national licenses of two pro-government television channels that they often broadcast violent content and present violent content. war criminals and crime figures.
Authorities have launched a gun crackdown after the shootings and sent police to schools to try to boost the sense of security. Facing public pressure, increasingly autocratic leader Vucic has scheduled a rally of his own for next week while suggesting the entire government could resign and an early vote called for September.
He will also attend a pro-government demonstration on Friday in a town north of Belgrade that will begin at the same time as that of the opposition in the Serbian capital.
Interior Minister Bratislav Gasic, whose resignation protesters are calling for, defended police measures after the shootings. He also told parliament that citizens have so far handed in more than 23,000 guns and more than 1 million rounds of ammunition since a month-long amnesty period was declared after the shootings.
“The police could not have known or predicted that something like this would happen,” he said of the school shooting, which was the first in Serbia.
Gasic also confirmed media reports that a man who was released from a psychiatric hospital on Thursday fired an anti-tank missile at an empty house from a rocket launcher in the town of Ruma, outside Belgrade. No one was injured in the incident and Gasic said two people were arrested.
Serbia is awash with weapons left over from the wars of the 1990s, including rocket launchers and hand grenades. Other gun control measures announced after the shootings include better control of gun owners and shooting ranges, a moratorium on new licenses and tough sentences for illegal gun possession.
