On this picture supplied by the Serbian Inside Ministry, Serbian Gendarmerie officers present the U.S.-made Lengthy Vary Acoustic System (LRAD) – which is prohibited in Serbia and lots of different international locations, in Belgrade, Serbia on March 19, 2025.
AP/Serbian Inside Ministry through AP
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AP/Serbian Inside Ministry through AP
BELGRADE, Serbia — Ivana Ilic Sunderic had by no means heard something fairly so alarming and disturbing at a protest because the sound that broke a commemorative silence throughout an enormous anti-government rally in Serbia’s capital, Belgrade.
“It was quiet and peaceable after which we heard one thing we couldn’t see … like a sound rolling towards us, a whiz,” Ilic Sunderic mentioned concerning the March 15 incident. “Folks began speeding for security towards the pavement, feeling that one thing was transferring towards us down the road.”
It was “a subdued sound lasting solely 2-3 seconds however very uncommon and really horrifying, like a sound from hell,” she mentioned.
Ilic Sunderic was not alone in describing the panic. Lots of of others have provided comparable accounts, triggering accusations that the police, army or safety providers underneath the tight management of authoritarian Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic used an acoustic crowd management weapon to focus on peaceable protesters.
The weapons, that are unlawful in Serbia, emit sound waves which may set off sharp ear ache, disorientation, eardrum ruptures and even irreversible listening to injury.
The incident piled extra strain on Vucic, who has been rattled by practically 5 months of anti-corruption protests over the collapse in November of a concrete cover at a railway station within the northern city of Novi Unhappy that killed 16 individuals.
Serbia’s officers have issued usually contradictory denials that an acoustic weapon was directed on the demonstrators. Calls have been mounting for solutions as to what precipitated the sudden commotion, if not a sonic gadget.
An Related Press video exhibits 1000’s of protesters holding up their lit cellphones in silence after they all of a sudden begin operating away in panic. A swooshing sound can then be heard.
“I’ve been going to protests for 30 years however I’ve by no means heard something like this,” Ilic Sunderic mentioned.
Lies and fabrications
A defiant Vucic has rejected what he known as “lies and fabrications” that the safety providers focused the demonstrators with a sonic gadget. He mentioned that such accusations are a part of an alleged Western-orchestrated ploy to topple him.
“If there was a single piece of proof {that a} sound cannon was used towards demonstrators, then I might not be president,” he mentioned.
Serbia’s police, military and the state safety company, BIA, initially all denied possessing the U.S.-made Lengthy Vary Acoustic System (LRAD), which is prohibited in Serbia and another international locations. When introduced with pictures of the gadget mounted on an off-road car and deployed on the rally of lots of of 1000’s of protesters, officers admitted possessing a sonic weapon, however insisted it was not used towards the protesters.
The pictures confirmed nothing greater than “loudspeakers” that additionally can be found on eBay, Inside Minister Ivica Dacic mentioned. The oblong gadgets, bought from a U.S. provider in 2021, serve to emit warnings to the crowds in case of main hassle, he mentioned.
“Serbian police have by no means, together with March 15, used any unlawful or unallowed gadget that’s not envisaged by the regulation, together with the gadget often known as a sound cannon,” Dacic mentioned. “Police solely use sound gadgets for warnings.”
Sonic weapons use sound waves to incapacitate, disorient or hurt people by harnessing acoustic power, inflicting each bodily and psychological results, similar to dizziness, disorientation or extreme complications.
Though usually described as non-lethal, their use in army, regulation enforcement and covert operations has raised severe moral considerations.
Extra not too long ago, sonic gadgets have been used towards Somali pirates in addition to migrants in Greece and reportedly in Serbia.
Photos from the Belgrade protest present what seems to be an LRAD 450XL.
The California-based producer, Genasys, mentioned on X that “the video and audio proof now we have seen and heard to date doesn’t assist using an LRAD throughout the March fifteenth incident in Belgrade, Serbia.”
Lots of complained of penalties
Many who had been within the crowd later complained of complications, confusion, ear strain or nausea.
Sasa Cvrkovic, a 23-year-old political science scholar from Belgrade, described the sound as a “jet that flew previous like some sort of wind.” He mentioned that it created panic and a quick stampede: “One younger man subsequent to me broke his leg.”
Cvrkovic mentioned he felt nauseous all via the day after the demonstration. Ilic Sunderic mentioned she felt strain in her head and ears.
Stories even have emerged of strain on medical doctors at Serbia’s emergency clinics to withhold data of lots of of people that sought medical assist and recommendation after the rally.
Specialists doubt the official model
Thomas Withington, an knowledgeable in digital warfare, radar and army communications on the Royal United Providers Institute assume tank, mentioned he reviewed a number of the movies from the Belgrade stampede.
“Extraordinary movie of individuals gathering, protesting within the streets peacefully, the demonstration,” he mentioned in an interview. “And all of a sudden, an nearly sort of biblical passing of an enormous variety of individuals in a really panicked rush, very sudden and really panicked motion, and the likes of which I need to confess I’ve by no means seen earlier than.”
He mentioned it was clear that one thing precipitated a number of hundred individuals to all of a sudden panic and transfer in a really particular method, speeding for canopy to the pavement and abandoning the center of the road.
“So definitely, the conduct that you simply see on the movie does seem like in line with individuals reacting en masse to one thing that’s making them really feel deeply unsettled or deeply uncomfortable,” he mentioned.
Predrag Petrovic, a analysis supervisor on the Belgrade Middle for Safety Coverage, a assume tank, mentioned, “We will declare with large chance that some unconventional weapon, some model of a sonic cannon, was used.”
“I’ve plenty of expertise in collaborating and monitoring avenue protests and I’ve by no means seen a stampede occur in a second and alongside an nearly straight line,” Petrovic mentioned.
In an internet petition signed by over half one million individuals, the Serbian opposition Transfer-Change motion requested the United Nations, the Council of Europe and the Group for Safety and Cooperation in Europe for an unbiased investigation.
A number of Serbian rights teams introduced Tuesday they’ve taken the problem to the European Courtroom of Human Rights, saying that they collected greater than 4,000 testimonies from individuals who complained of varied bodily and psychological issues after the incident on March 15. The courtroom in Strasbourg has given Serbia till the top of the month to reply, the teams mentioned in a joint assertion.
Vucic’s pro-Russia authorities, nonetheless, invited the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation and Russia’s Federal Safety Service, the FSB, to analyze. There was no rapid reply from the American and Russian safety companies.
