Serbian police detain dozens amid clashes with anti-government demonstrators -VIDEO

“We show once again that we will not stop,” law student Stefan Ivakovic told the AFP news agency. “We will rally as long as it takes until the demands are met.”

Sladjana Lojanovic, 37, a farmer from the town of Sid in the north, said she came to Belgrade to support the students.

“The institutions have been usurped and… there is a lot of corruption. Elections are the solution, but I don’t think he [Vucic] will want to go peacefully,” she told Reuters.

Ahead of Saturday’s protest, organisers issued an “ultimatum” for Vucic to announce elections by 9pm (19:00 GMT) – a demand he had rejected well before the deadline.

As the protest ended, organisers played a statement to the crowd, calling for Serbians to “take freedom into your own hands” and giving them the “green light”.

“The authorities had all the mechanisms and all the time to meet the demands and prevent an escalation,” the organisers said in a statement on Instagram after the rally.

“Instead, they chose violence and repression against the citizens. Any radicalisation of the situation is their responsibility.”

Hours before the protest at Slavija Square, Vucic’s party sent in buses of its own supporters from other parts of the country, many wearing T-shirts reading: “We won’t give up Serbia.”

They were joining loyalists who have been camping near Vucic’s office in central Belgrade since mid-March.

Vucic, a populist whose Progressive Party-led coalition holds 156 of 250 parliamentary seats, told reporters on Saturday that unspecified “foreign powers” were behind the protest.

He said police should be restrained, but warned that “thugs will face justice”.

Vucic has previously refused snap elections and has been intent on continuing his second term, which ends in 2027, when there are also parliamentary elections scheduled.

But his hold on power has been rattled, with opponents accusing him and allies of ties to organised crime, violence against rivals and curbing media freedoms – charges they deny.

In the days ahead of the protest, police arrested about a dozen antigovernment activists, charging them with undermining the constitution and terrorism. All denied the charges.

Police also arrested several people accused of allegedly plotting to overthrow the government and banned entry into the country, without explanation, to several people from Croatia and a theatre director from Montenegro.

Serbia’s railway company halted train service over an alleged bomb threat in what critics said was an apparent bid to prevent people from travelling to Belgrade for the rally.