The Pride Caravan scheduled for Saturday in Pirot was officially cancelled due to an escalation of tensions and credible threats to the safety of participants. A group of men opposed to the event gathered at the local town square, preventing members of the organization “Da se zna!” from entering the city center.
Police, equipped with riot gear, were deployed to the scene and ultimately determined that the safety of the activists could not be guaranteed. During the event, the security situation deteriorated to the point that a reporter from N1 was struck in the head by a tomato while covering the developments.
The N1 crew also reported that they were targeted by the gathered crowd and subjected to verbal abuse, alongside the derogatory messages directed at the LGBT community.
“Da se zna!”, one of the organizers of the Belgrade Pride, initiated the Pride Caravan to promote LGBT+ rights across Serbia. The incident in Pirot stands in sharp contrast to the Pride Caravan held the previous day in Vranje, which proceeded without any incidents.
While local observers noted that Vranje successfully passed a “test of tolerance,” the same could not be said for Pirot, where the hostile environment necessitated the cancellation of the event.
Source: N1
