In Belgrade, protesters against the election results gathered near the city administration building and tried to break in. Police responded with tear gas, Radio Liberty reports.

The protests, announced by the pro-European opposition bloc "Serbia Against Violence", have been going on for seven days in Serbia. After the announcement of the results of the early parliamentary and municipal elections, the opposition accused the authorities of stealing votes and said that the victory of the ruling coalition in the Belgrade City Assembly was "out of the question."

Representatives of the opposition, who gathered for a protest on December 24, said they wanted to enter the Belgrade administration building and speak from the balcony of the city hall. The protesters broke the glass of the front door. The Kurir publication claims that the door was broken down and that the protesters threw burning flares into the building.

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic addressed the nation and said that "no revolution is taking place" and the protesters "will not succeed". According to him, about 2,490 people gathered on the streets of the Serbian capital, "some showed their faces", and "violence is their only way of fighting".

Vucic also said that foreign special services had informed Serbian law enforcement agencies in advance of the upcoming riots and plans to seize the Belgrade City Administration building by opposition supporters. 

"Many people pretended to be naive and did not want to hear or see what was happening. I am grateful to those foreign services that made it clear that they knew what was being prepared and provided information to our special services, which responded in a timely manner and knew exactly what the attackers were planning," the President of the Republic said.


Later it became known that about 40 people were detained during the riots in Belgrade. Several more people are currently being identified and will be arrested in the near future, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said, according to local media. 


Several police officers were injured during the dispersal of the protesters, two of them were seriously injured.  


Vucic called the attempted seizure of the Belgrade administration "an attack on the country's sovereignty," and Serbian Prime Minister Ana Brnabic thanked the Russian special services for "information about the preparation of riots."