Pro-Milosevic demo in Belgrade

(2 Jul 2001)

1. Various of thousands of demonstrators gathered in front of federal parliament building waving flags
2. Police standing by
3. Seselj (centre in glasses) mingling with the crowds
4. Crowds
5. Seselj and others climb steps to address crowd
6. Various of crowds chanting and raising fists in the air
7. SOUNDBITE: (Serbo-Croat) Member of Serbian Radical Party
"By this act they have confirmed that a dictatorship has been established. They don't recognise the parliament or the government and this shows that Serbia is run by dukes and princes who run the country as their own private property."
8. Various of crowds chanting
9. Various of crowds advancing down streets of Belgrade
10. Crowd at Republican Square (end point of march)
11. Mid shot crowd holding photos of Milosevic
12. SOUNDBITE: (Serbo-Croat) Vojislav Seselj, Head of Serbian Radical Party
"Serbian traitors Djindjic and Kostunica are afraid of our unity, dignity and pride, and they know that we are going to put all the traitors and thieves into a rat's den."
13. Wide of crowd waving flags

STORYLINE:

Chanting "Treason" and "Let's Rise Up", thousands of Slobodan Milosevic's supporters rallied in Belgrade on Monday to protest at the Serbian government's move to hand the former president over to the U-N war crimes tribunal in The Hague.

About 10-thousand flag-waving supporters of Milosevic's Socialist Party and its ally, the ultra-nationalist Radical Party, gathered in front of the downtown federal parliament building.

Ultranationalist Radical Party leader Vojislav Seselj was there to address the crowd.

He said that in the whole of Serbia's history, it had never had such traitors in power.

And he appealed to the army and police "to prevent the future handover of our heroes to The Hague," promising "a fierce and relentless battle" against current government officials.

The protesters also demanded new elections, hoping they would unseat the pro-democracy government of Serbia, the main Yugoslav republic, which unseated Milosevic in October.

The turnout was the biggest out of three pro-Milosevic protests organised since his extradition last Thursday, but was still disappointing, and it showed how popular support for Milosevic had dwindled since his nationalist campaigns led to four Balkan wars.

Most Serbs expressed relief at the prospect of putting his 13-year era of ruinous rule behind them.

Zoran Djindjic, the Serbian prime minister who was behind the sudden extradition, has said that all other Serb suspects living on the territory of Yugoslavia - believed to number about a dozen - will soon join the former strongman in The Hague.

Despite Djindjic's readiness to fully cooperate with the tribunal - including the exchange of crucial evidence to sentence Milosevic for war crimes in Kosovo - opposition might come from a nationalist faction within the new government.

Milosevic's extradition has triggered a government crisis in Yugoslavia, whose main political leaders are split over the move.

Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica and politicians from the smaller republic of Montenegro opposed the extradition.

Kostunica and other Serb pro-democracy leaders held internal talks on Monday about the composition of a reshuffled Yugoslav Cabinet, following the resignation last week of the Yugoslav prime minister, Zoran Zizic, a Montenegrin.

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