Serbians take to the streets in their thousands for environmental and anti-government demonstrations

Thousands took to the streets in Serbia to protest against the government and a project by the Anglo-Australian company Rio Tinto to set up a lithium mine, writes Cristian Gherasim.

The protestors filled the streets for the past two weekends, but the number of those taking part has increased significantly over the past week.

Their ire has been directed towards a recently enacted law which paves the way for land expropriation for public interest projects, with environmental activists believing it would speed up Rio Tinto's environmentally damaging project to open a lithium mine in western Serbia, a key mineral, essential for manufacturing batteries for electric cars.

This past few days saw swarms of protesters gathering on the main bridge of the capital city of Belgrade, chanting "Rio Tinto, leave the Drina River!" and carrying slogans with messages such as "Stop investing, save nature!" or "For land, water and air".

On the other hand, the Anglo-Australian company has promised to meet all Serbian and European environmental standards, but environmentalists say the $2.4 billion lithium mine project will irreversibly pollute land and drinking water resources in the area.

The protests come ahead of next year’s parliamentary and presidential elections. The protesters accused the government's authoritarian policy and President Aleksandar Vucic's Progressive Party of backing a law that eliminates the 50% plus one quorum for validating referendums.

The issue of business investments and rather Russian and Chinese influence in Serbia has been the topic of a study carried out GLOBSEC Policy Institute which stated that Serbia is the most susceptible to Russian and Chinese interference in both politics and business.

The index follows a two-year project backed by the U.S. Department of State’s Global Engagement Center, analyzing vulnerable points, targeted by foreign influence, in eight countries: Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Montenegro, Northern Macedonia, Romania, Serbia and Slovakia.

Serbia is the most vulnerable to Russian and Chinese influence and receives 66 points out of 100.

China has been targeting repeatedly the region of Western Balkans trying to increase its clout. According to specialists, Chinese leaders seek to increase influence in states that do not yet enforce EU law.

Beijing in trying to secure various resources even in some EU member states. China's recent actions highlight, for example, the interest in transforming the ports of Piraeus (Greece) and Zadar (Croatia) into hubs for China's trade with Europe. To the same end, an agreement was signed to build a high-speed railway between Budapest and Belgrade, which would connect with the port of Piraeus, thus consolidating the access of Chinese products to Europe.

On the other hand Russian is more interested in Western Balkans to disrupt the EU-NATO integration process there.

“The most vulnerable countries are mostly those that have closer bilateral relations with Russia and have societies that are more pro-Russian and favourable to a pro-Russian narrative,” Dominika Hajdu of GLOBSEC believes.

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