• Serbia heads to the polls on Oct 25 as critics complain of repression
• Indexes show press freedoms and corruption backsliding under Vucic
• Digital rights group says at least 14 people targeted with advanced spyware
• Activists and students say they were intimidated or beaten

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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."

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Student protests began on November 1, 2024, after a concrete canopy outside the train station of the northern Serbian city Novi Sad collapsed, ultimately leading to the deaths of 16 passersby. The train station had been freshly reopened after a renovation conducted by Chinese contractors, and many blamed corruption and shoddy workmanship. Endemic corruption has long been a feature of Serbian political culture in the eyes of its citizens.

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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.

[In addition to these 14 people, an investigation revealed another two cases of pro-democracy figures being targeted with 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.

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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.

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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."

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