In Serbia, independent journalists are at risk of physical attacks, verbal threats, smear campaigns and intimidation, all perpetrated with complete impunity by public officials, law enforcers and private individuals. Artists and cultural workers also report that their funding is systematically cut and their access to public spaces and media is restricted, and those who dare to express dissent face retaliation.

In June 2024, I wrote in these pages about Dinko Gruhonjić, then a 53-year-old Serbian writer and academic who became the subject of a smear campaign and received several death threats. A journalist and lecturer in the faculty of philosophy at the University of Novi Sad in Vojvodina, northern Serbia, and the author of three books, Gruhonjić has long been targeted by pro-government tabloids for his staunch criticism of Serbian nationalism and the glorification of war criminals. This celebration of past violence, together with revisionist narratives, hate speech and the denial of war crimes and genocide by political leaders in Serbia and Republika Srpska, continues to threaten peace and stability in the region. Anyone who speaks up risks intimidation and other repercussions. 

The suppression of free expression in Serbia has intensified since student-led protests began in November 2024. PEN International recently highlighted the plight of Vladimir Arsenijević, an award-winning writer, translator and publisher, and president and creative director of KROKODIL, an internationally acclaimed association focusing on literature, culture and sociopolitical programmes. On 11 July 2026, a group of twenty to thirty youths verbally and physically assaulted Arsenijević. KROKODIL had planned an event commemorating the 1995 Srebrenica genocide that day as part of the People Remember People coalition, when Arsenijević was ambushed by unknown assailants under Branko’s Bridge in Belgrade. They stole his phone, sprayed graffiti on the bridge glorifying war criminals and left him with facial injuries. At the time of writing, no one has been detained in connection with the attack.

Threats against KROKODIL by both state and non-state actors escalated after the Russian Federation’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. On 20 September 2024, a group of Russian-speaking men wearing clothes with far-right Serbian imagery entered KROKODIL’s premises, removed a Ukrainian flag and intimidated staff. The following month, an activist with KROKODIL was called to the Serbian Security Information Agency to give information about the incident. The activist left a phone unattended outside the interview room for the duration of the meeting. Subsequently, forensic analysis of the phone by Amnesty International found evidence that NoviSpy Android spyware had been installed during that time.

In March 2025, student-led protests, including the largest single mass demonstration in Serbia’s modern history, called for the resignation of President Aleksandar Vučić. Interviewed by the media outlet BUKA about the protests, Arsenijević wrote in terms indicative of Serbia’s wider problems: 

What disturbs me the most in all of this is the fact that the so-called ‘veterans’ of the infamous 63rd Parachute Brigade, notorious for the crimes it committed in Kosovo, have somehow become the self-proclaimed paramilitary police of the protests. Who delegated them this right? They line up with their berets and beer bellies, supposedly providing security for the protest while carrying out some kind of ‘citizen arrests’. There are recordings of them tying people’s hands and taking them somewhere. Does anyone know who these people are? Why were they deprived of their freedom by other civilians who call themselves veterans? Where did they take them? Does anyone care about that? How is something like that even possible? It terrifies me, the arbitrariness of a frantic, street-level justice carried out by people who should primarily be tried for war crimes. Yet, citizens enthusiastically applaud this, cheer on this barbarism, and even eroticise these villains who have inserted themselves into a place where they should never have been, calling them heroes, warriors, true Serbs, champions, wonderful souls, and cool guys, convinced that they will protect us and our children.

Readers might like to send appeals calling on the Serbian authorities to abide by their national and international obligations to uphold the right to freedom of expression and fundamental rights; to immediately end all attacks on independent media, journalists, academics and other creatives; to hold to account all those found responsible for crimes against writers and journalists.

Appeals to be addressed to:

Đuro Macut
Prime Minister of the Republic of Serbia
Nemanjina 11, Belgrade, Serbia
Email: predsednikvlade@gov.rs

Katarina Milenković
Minister Counsellor
Embassy of Serbia
28 Belgrave Square, London SW1X 8QB
Email: srb.emb.uk@mfa.rs

Update: On 28 July 2026, six months after a cassation appeal was filed on behalf of Cuban journalist and academic José Gabriel Barrenechea Chávez (LR, June 2025), Cuba’s Supreme People’s Court upheld his six-year prison sentence, ending his last opportunity to appeal. The writer has remained in detention since 15 January 2026, when he was convicted of ‘public disorder’ in relation to his critical literature and activism. Barrenechea was arrested on 8 November 2024 after participating in a peaceful protest in Encrucijada, Villa Clara. He was accused of leading the demonstration, but video evidence shows that he neither engaged in violence nor incited disorder but was merely exercising his right to peaceful protest. Barrenechea’s health has significantly worsened since his arrest. He is suffering from severe malnutrition, infections, sleep disorders, anxiety and depression. PEN continues to call for his release.