Hundreds of people on Sunday, January 30, took the streets of Serbia in protest to draw attention to the country’s increasing rate of air pollution, demanding that authorities take action to improve air quality.
The protest which was held in central Belgrade was the latest in a series of gatherings organized by the increasingly visible environmental movements in the country.
Like much of the Western Balkans, Serbia is facing many environmental problems as a result of decades of neglect on the part of the government and concerned authorities.
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Organizers of the protest demanded that the government come out to inform the public about the air quality index on national TV, insisting that bad air kills thousands of people each year in Serbia.
One of the organizers, Bojan Simsic said “Serbia has a very dramatic problem with air pollution”. “We have the highest mortality in Europe and one of the highest in the world from poor air quality”.
Some of the protesters, including families with small children, carried banners that had such inscriptions as “Stop air pollution!” or “You are suffocating us!” They blocked traffic in a central street before marching toward the government headquarters.
Experts say the poor air quality in Belgrade is the result of using low-quality coal at nearby power plants, having thousands of polluting old cars in the capital, and older systems for home heating.
Recall that weeks of road blockades drawing thousands of people had recently forced authorities to scrap a project for lithium mining by the Rio Tinto company in western Serbia.
