The opposition in the Serbian parliament is boycotting today's session after yesterday's incident with smoke bombs and flares, in which three MPs from the ruling Serbian Progressive Party were injured, BTA reports.
President Aleksandar Vucic told Pink TV last night that all injured MPs are in stable condition. One of them, who suffered a stroke, is in stable condition, and the MP, who is eight months pregnant, is also in good condition, along with her baby.
Early this morning, police searched the plenary hall of the National Assembly after a report of an explosive device was filed, but they found nothing suspicious.
The agenda of the Serbian parliament for today includes about 70 items, one of which is the resignation of the government.
Prime Minister Miloš Vučević resigned on January 28 under pressure from mass protests demanding responsibility for the tragedy in Novi Sad. On November 1 last year, the concrete canopy of the city's train station collapsed, killing 15 people. Two of the injured are still receiving treatment at the Vojvodina Clinical Center.
Yesterday, a draft law on a 20% increase in university budget funds was included in the parliament's agenda - one of the four demands of students who have been blocking over 60 faculties since the end of November in solidarity with the families of those killed in Novi Sad.
Opposition parties insist that the outgoing government has no authority to introduce new laws, and students have announced that these legislative changes are not a priority until fair sentences are reached for the guilty and the prosecution of students, political and civil activists who participated in the protests is stopped.
Despite the students' refusal to engage in dialogue with the party, opposition deputies placed posters in the plenary hall with the inscriptions “general strike” and “justice for the murdered“, expressing solidarity with the messages of the protesting students.
In the center of the plenary hall, filled with smoke from the bombs used, a banner was placed with the inscription “Serbia is rising up to bring down the regime“, and the deputies from the majority and minority threw water bottles at each other.
The Speaker of the Parliament, Ana Brnabić, declared that the Assembly would continue to work and called on the deputies to return to their seats. “Labor and struggle will win. It is good that you showed your true colors. You want to come to power through tear gas“, she said last night, raising the Serbian flag from the parliamentary rostrum.
Meanwhile, citizens and students paid tribute to the dead by observing a 15-minute silence at the intersection near the parliament. Then some of them threw eggs at the building and chanted "thieves".