By Ivana Sekularac
BELGRADE, Oct 22 (Reuters) - Serbian activist Marko Marjanovic was on his way back from the supermarket in Belgrade when masked officers bundled him into a car and took him to a police station basement where he was held in solitary confinement for two days under bright lights.
Marjanovic, a popular social media commentator and vocal opponent of Serbia's long-time leader Aleksandar Vucic, said he was terrified, and it wasn't the first time. Days before that, in August 2025, police
had beaten up Marjanovic during anti-government protests, part of what he and his lawyer describe as a campaign to silence him.
As former President Vucic seeks to extend his 12-year hold on power by running for prime minister in an October 25 election, interviews with activists, student protesters and opposition politicians paint an increasingly authoritarian picture of the Balkan country where critics are routinely threatened, press freedoms are waning and corruption is on the rise.
"How much corruption...how much destruction of everything that should and must be of value here. Someone has to be held accountable," said Marjanovic, who has experienced lengthy social media bans for his posts, one of which included the phone number of acting President Ana Brnabic, who was speaker of parliament at the time.
Vucic and his Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) have repeatedly denied accusations of repression and corruption. His office and the Interior Ministry did not respond to requests for comment on this story.
PRESS FREEDOM AT NEW LOW AS PROTESTS GROW
Vucic is facing his biggest political challenge since coming to power: the student-led protest movement, which blossomed in the wake of the Novi Sad train station canopy collapse that killed 16 people in 2024, is now fielding 250 of its own candidates in Sunday's election. A poll this week put the students neck and neck with the SNS.
"For as long as the SNS have been in power, there has never been such good organisation on that pro-democratic side of society," said Dragan Popovic, who heads the Center for Practical Politics. "The more (Vucic) is threatened, the more the pressure increases."
After serving as information minister in the late 1990s when then-President Slobodan Milosevic sought to silence critics of Serbia's war in Kosovo and subsequent clashes with NATO, Vucic broke with the ultra-nationalist Serbian Radical Party in 2008 and now says that he wants the country to join the European Union.
But Serbia's credentials have slipped.
The 2026 World Press Freedom Index compiled by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) ranked Serbia 104th out of 180 countries, the lowest ever, and also the worst in the EU-Balkan region. In Transparency International's 2025 Corruption Perceptions Index, Serbia's score was the lowest in two decades.
According to RSF, six Serbian journalists - including four who fled this year - are in exile because of threats to their security motivated by political attacks. Data from the Slavko Curuvija Foundation, a non-governmental media organisation, says that Vucic verbally attacked journalists and media outlets at least 182 times in the first nine months of this year.
Vucic has denied intimidating the media and says he has not shut down any news organisations.
But veteran reporters say things are getting worse. Veran Matic runs a commission for the safety of journalists. In June, a young man attacked him and took his phone when he filmed a protest, and he was insulted on the streets. He blames the violence on Vucic, who has publicly singled out Matic for criticism. Reuters could not verify the assertion and Vucic's office did not respond to a question on the matter.
"There is almost no day, almost no week, without attacks occurring, not only against me, but against many journalists," Matic told Reuters.
CYBERATTACKS AND SPYWARE
Members of the student movement and other high-profile Vucic adversaries have also been the victims of cyberattacks, watchdogs say. Digital rights group SHARE Foundation said in September that 14 people had been targeted with advanced spyware.
Jelena Kontic, who has been part of the nationwide protest movement to oust Vucic, said she received a message from Apple in March saying that the Pegasus spyware tool may have been installed on her phone. Later forensic tests, including by Canadian cyber watchdog group Citizen Lab, confirmed this, she added.
"They had access to your entire life," Kontic said. "They knew when I have a workout, when I sleep, when I eat, when I drink water, how much water I drink, what I eat."
Serbia's Security Information Agency called claims of state involvement "trivial sensationalism" and Brnabic said at the time that the students had "absolutely not" been spied on. Interior Ministry officials have also dismissed allegations of cyberespionage.
Kontic is not alone, though. Two Serbian opposition figures were recently targeted with powerful cyberespionage tools, according to one of the men and a report issued on Monday by Citizen Lab.
Reuters could not determine who was responsible for the alleged infections. Israel's NSO Group, the maker of Pegasus, has said it only sells to governments.
VIDEO CAPTURES BRUTAL BEATING
Nowhere is the threat to safety more apparent than on the streets, where protesters say police have often used force against peaceful demonstrations.
Dusan Radovic, a 26-year-old architect, was helping someone who had fallen over as police rushed a crowd of protesters in the town of Valjevo in August last year when officers in riot gear began striking him with batons.
"Ten of them surrounded me, they kicked me, spit on me, at one point one stepped on my head. They put me up and then continued hitting so I fell down," Radovic told Reuters.
A video verified by Reuters captures the beating. It was two months before he could walk without limping.
Radovic was among 25 people, some of them minors, who were badly beaten that night, according to an independent report by forensic specialist Dr. Djordje Alempijevic.
"Injuries are not the result of isolated incidents or necessary police self-defence, but demonstrate a clear, organised and systemic pattern of punitive police brutality and torture," the report said.
The Interior Ministry did not respond to a question on the Valjevo protest and the report.
"My first reaction was anger, anger at those people capable of such cruelty," Radovic told Reuters. "But then I realised I cannot withdraw after this. I have to fight for justice and truth."
(Reporting by Ivana Sekularac; Additional reporting by Aleksandar Vasovic; Editing by Edward McAllister, Kirsten Donovan)
