Serbian Tabloids Misused Zoran Gavrilovic’s Statement: He Did Not Say They Would “Kill Everyone” With Guns

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Original article (in Serbian) was published on 5/6/2025; Author: Teodora Koledin

On Tuesday, several tabloid web portals published a news article with a manipulated quote from Zoran Gavrilovic, Director of the Bureau for Social Research (BIRODI). “SCANDAL! The ideologue of the blockers said: Unfortunately, we don’t have guns, but if we did, we’d kill them all! (VIDEO)”– states the headline of the article published by Alo. The same claim was also shared by the following web portals: Novosti, Informer, Pink and Republika (the web portal of Serbian Telegraph). However, upon retrospective review of this TV appearance, Tragac concluded that the second half of the alleged quote was completely fabricated.

Speaking about the upcoming local elections in Zajecar and Kosjeric during the morning program on N1 television, Zoran Gavrilovic stated the following:

“I think a victory would be – looking at it from the perspective of civil society and the strengthening of our fragile and weak democracy – to make serious reports and provide evidence of what happened in those two cities. To share that with international organizations, with the European Commission”.

When asked by the journalist whether those reports would have any effect, the Director of the Bureau for Social Research replied:

“Well, what can we do? Simply, we don’t have guns. We don’t even have media to use like guns- because that’s what this government does. Unlike the 1990s, this government now uses media like guns. So our role is to work on what we’ve discussed – to gather information, to insist on the rule of law, to insist that institutions do their jobs…”

To illustrate, here’s how the headline would look if we bolded all the parts added by the tabloids and left unbolded only the actual words spoken:

Unfortunately, we don’t have guns, and if we did, we’d kill them all!

We also reached out for comment to Zoran Gavrilovic, director of BIRODI, who told Tragac that “five web portals published the same story with a headline containing a falsehood”, referring to a shortened version of his statement with something added that he never said.

“This case shows that there are media outlets tasked with belittling and discrediting public appearances where facts about the nature of the government and its illegal behavior, primarily by the President of the Republic, are presented. This is retaliation for pointing out violations of the Constitution and the law by the President. At the same time, it indicates the collapse of media pluralism through coordinated media editorial offices”, Gavrilovic explained.

It should also not be overlooked that the Director of the Bureau for Social Research was baselessly labelled as the “ideologue of the blockers”, referring to students involved in blockades – a label that has recently become common in pro-government media.

Tragac has recorded more than 15 individuals who, over the past six months, have been assigned this “title” by certain media outlets, including: Ivan Videnovic, Goran Markovic, Dinko Gruhonjic, Srdjan Skoro, Natasa Kandic, Milan St. Protic, Srdjan Zunic, Zoran Gavrilovic, Cedomir Stojkovic, Biljana Stojkovic, Cvjetin Milivojevic, Jovo Bakic, Zdenko Tomanovic, Nemanja Sarovic, Bozidar Prelevic, Milivoj Beslin, Goran Jesic, and others.

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