President comments on fuel price protests

Aleksandar Vucic spoke about protests over high prices of fuel that blocked streets several cities in Serbia, to say that he also feels guilty.

"It's eating me up inside that I, as usual, said let them do what they like, and that I said it publicly," the Serbian president said on Tuesday, while attending the opening of German supermarket chain Lidl's logistics center in Stara Pazova, near Belgrade.

He described the beating of a citizen during the blockade of the Zrenjanin Road in Borca as a brutal act of violence of the kind that has not been seen in Serbia in the last ten years. "It's sad that some people want to hide it and present it as an accident. What accident? The man was brutally beaten because he asked (protesters) 'why are you doing this'. These people prevented the freedom of movement guaranteed by the Constitution," Vucic said.

According to him, two out of the three men who were arrested for assaulting the citizen in question, but also for stealing his bag, have previous criminal records. "Nice people, the future of Serbia...," remarked Vucic.

"It's eating me up inside that I, as usual, said let them do what they like, and that I said it publicly," he said, adding that when it comes to fuel price protests, the authorities will work in accordance with the law, and will not allow people to be "beaten and battered, while everyone pretends it was an accident."