In euronews with DPA/AFP/AP • Last update: 5/9/2023 – 7:58 AM
After a 13-year-old boy intruded on his school, President Vucic announced a drastic reduction in the use of firearms. But this is not enough for many. Meanwhile, classes have resumed – with heavy police presence in schools across the country.
In Serbia, schoolchildren are returning to school for the first time after two devastating mass shootings. Police forces are on duty in all 1,800 schools across the country. More than 2,000 police officers patrol in and around the school buildings.
“Just deliver. That’s all”
President Aleksandar Vucic announced a drastic reduction in the number of guns in circulation in the country following the recent shootings. “One of the measures is that we are going to start confiscating illegal firearms.
People have one month to hand over weapons and ammunition without consequences. No one will ask how you got those weapons. Just hand them over. That is all.”
After the killing of a 13-year-old at his school and a 20-year-old in a village near Belgrade, with a total of 17 deaths, people’s anger against the government and its handling of gun violence is growing.
Main initiator of the “Serbian tragedy”
At Porteste, resignations are high. So did criticism of state-controlled media that glorified violence and covered up convicted war criminals.
A deomanstrant: “We have to rebuild the system from the bottom up, including the education system. I’m a mother of two and I want them to live in better times than I did, in the 1990s, 2000s and now.”
One pensioner adds: “The whole atmosphere in society was created by the system, especially by the ‘first man’ who is the main initiator of this Serbian tragedy.”
Serbia has the highest per capita gun ownership in Europe and ranks third in the world. According to estimates, the number of officially unregistered weapons is around one and a half million.