Original article (in Serbian) was published on 22/1/2026; Author: Ivan Subotić
The Serbian Broadcasting Corporation (RTS) reported in its Dnevnik 2 on the announced blockade of the Faculty of Philosophy in Novi Sad with a segment whose most significant elements were incorrect or manipulative.
The statement from the faculty administration was presented incorrectly, and the police intervention, which has many documented instances of violent conduct, was described as a “clearing of the building.” Even the dean’s name was not correctly stated – neither in the anchor’s spoken text nor in the caption of his address – since instead of “Milivoj Alanović,” he was introduced as “Milivoje.” RTS also showed its attitude toward the new scenes of violence by placing the report in the final minutes of the Dnevnik, in less than 100 seconds.
What did the faculty “support” at a Senate session?
Summarizing the case of Professor Jelena Kleut, in its news program, RTS says that the dean’s office “announced that the representatives of the Faculty of Philosophy at the session supported the report by which her appointment was rejected.” However, this is not correct. The Faculty bodies accepted the appointment of Jelena Kleut, and the deanery statement said that “the administration remains faithful to the principle that faculty representatives in university bodies represent the interests of faculty employees and vote in accordance with the decisions of the faculty’s Teaching and Scientific Council and the Election Council,” noting that the most recent Senate session was no exception. In other words, the faculty stated in its announcement that it represented the position at the Senate that Kleut should be elected to the position of full professor.
However, it is not possible to know for sure how the representatives of the Faculty of Philosophy actually voted, since the voting was secret. Regardless, viewers of RTS could get the wrong impression that the Faculty of Philosophy, as an institution, was against the election of Jelena Kleut.
What the “clearing of the building” looked like
In the final part of the report, it was stated that the dean “called the police, who then cleared the building.” A clip was used showing people being pushed toward the exit, but – as usual – no footage was shown of the many videos in which police are seen behaving violently toward students, professors, and citizens. Among other things, Professor Kleut herself was forcibly pushed out of the building.
Reporters from Tragač attended the police action of forcibly removing students from the Faculty and pushing people away. They observed that the police treated students like sacks – hitting them with shields, dragging them across the floor, and kicking them. In one of the recordings, a student holds both hands up, one holding his student index card. Police first pushed him toward the exit, then snatched the card from his hands and struck him with it. The student was eventually pushed out of the building while unsuccessfully trying to reach the place where his card had fallen under the police boots.
RTS’s segment also did not include any of the many other actual videos of violence sharedon social media. Media outlets reported that during the police intervention, one student had his nose broken and that police officers punched those gathered.
The media reported that during the intervention, one student’s nose was broken, and that the police officers punched the crowd. The Association of Independent Electronic Media condemned the excessive use of force against journalists, professors and students, stating that those gathered were hit with shields and kicked in the legs, as well as that journalists from the newsrooms of Blokada Info, Mašina, Danas and other media were hindered in their work and forcefully pushed out of the venue even though they had journalist credentials.
An AI photo of violence against students has gone viral on social networks, in which a clumsy replica of the entrance to the Faculty of Philosophy building immediately catches the eye. One of the replies to the tweet with the fake visual (“Image and opportunity of a regime”) read, “Of all the images and opportunities of a regime – this one is the least, because it was generated in software that, unlike the real people at FFNS yesterday, suffered nothing.”
