Subotica, with its large ethnic population, is the closest city to the Hungarian border. It is also the site of an incident that occurred August 2, when a group of Serbs and people of other nationalities disrupted the private birthday party of a 17-year-old ethnic Hungarian boy. Between 20 and 30 people crashed the party and beat up several ethnic Hungarians. Five ended up in the hospital with serious injuries.

In Temerin, in mid-August, an ethnic Hungarian shop was set alight when unknown perpetrators burnt Hungarian and Serb flags hoisted side-by-side at a local police station. Molotov cocktails were thrown through the window, in an act that police say was not a robbery.

Worrisome tendencies

Such events are worrisome, especially considering the context. Since the brutal murder of former Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic, nationalism has shown signs of an upswing. In elections last December, for instance, the Serbian Radical Party, a radical nationalist party, swept the popular vote in the general elections. While the party was unable to form a government, they continue to have the strongest political faction in Belgrade.

Following the attacks against Serbia’s Hungarian minority, which have been consistent, the issue quickly became international. The Hungarian Socialist Party (MSZP) turned to the Council of Europe to initiate debate and start an urgent investigation to look into the violence against Hungarians in Vojvodina. MSZP representative József Gedei, a member of the party’s foreign affairs policy group, says several diplomatic steps were taken with Serb authorities, but to little avail. The conservative Fidesz-Hungarian Civic Union, for their part, managed - through the European People’s Party - to make sure every MEP in the faction was informed of the atrocities.

LOOKING THE OTHER WAY it is difficult to ascertain the motivations behind ethnic tensions in Vojvodina

Hungarian Foreign Minister László Kovács even sent a letter to Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Konstunica, which while it welcomed a meeting between the prime minister and representatives of the ethnic Hungarian minority and Serb interior ministry officials, urged that officials bring to justice those responsible for the recent violence. According to Predrag Markovic, Serbian Parliament president, more than 290 violent incidents have occurred on Serbian territory since the general election last December. Data on brutality against ethnic Hungarians shows different numbers, with reports varying from 50 to 300 separate incidents in the last six months alone.

Motivations are unclear

Behind these alleged incidents rests a motivation that is not always clear. Many of the acts occurred at schools or among young teenage boys, leaving it difficult to assess the depth of the problem. “There are three different official languages in Subotica and everybody has the opportunity to study his or her mother tongue,” says Erika Petrovics Roncsák, a teacher at a secondary school in Subotica. The conflicts between different ethnic groups, she says, usually start at school. Part of the problem is that ethnic Croatian, Serbian and ethnic Hungarian students study in separate classrooms in the same schools, which can cause alienation and separation between the ethnic groups.

In September 1990, Serbia stripped Vojvodina of its autonomy. Previously, it was an autonomous province with considerable self-governmental authority. Recently, the tension between some Serbian groups and individuals of other ethnicities has sharply increased, leading to violent incidents. Meanwhile, Petrovics Roncsák suspects that some of those behind the violence have been deprived of parts of their education over the last 10 years, and their frustration has led to their hostile behavior. During the Yugoslav wars of the early-to-mid 90s, schools were often closed due to lack of electricity and heating, or because teachers were demonstrating.

Oliver Dulic, Erika Petrovics Roncsák, Zoltán Dévári

The youth in town

In Subotica’s downtown, young ethnic Hungarian and Serbian skateboarders can be found congregating several meters from the city’s main square. “No matter who is Hungarian, or who is Serbian, I think everybody is cool here,” says one of them. The students have heard the reports of recent violence, but they argue that those kind of attacks are rare, and couldn’t point to any public place where ethnic Hungarians are afraid to speak their language. The students blame the spate of violence on undereducated or underemployed people.

There are different theories, meanwhile, as to what lies at the root of the inter-ethnic conflict. Rasim Ljajic, Serbia’s minister for ethnic minorities, says it is important neither to underestimate, nor to exaggerate the significance of the brutality against ethnic Hungarians in Vojvodina.

At a press conference in Budapest, he highlighted the violence that occurred in Kosovo on March 16 and 17, when Albanians attacked Serb minorities in the area. Over the next few days, scores of people were killed, 500 were injured, and 20 Serb churches and 35 homes were burned down. Although NATO forces in 1999 bombed Serbia to defend Kosovo Albanians from ethnic cleansing, the situation today has become reversed, Ljajic says.

The political dimension

Others see the incidents as having more specific political and economic motivations. “It is the economic lethargy (that) tends to strengthen ethnic tensions,” says Oliver Dulic, a representative of the Serbian Democratic Party of Subotica. Dulic downplays the gravity of the situation in Subotica and attributes the violence to upcoming local elections and economic malaise. “Hungarian politicians use these incidents for their campaign,” he says. “I belong to the Croatian minority at Subotica, and I do not feel any ethnic conflict. Why (were) there no atrocities against Croatians, while we were fighting a war with Serbians just a few years earlier?” he asks.

Pavel Domonji disagrees. As head of the Helsinki Human Rights Committee (HHRC) in Novi Sad, Domonji attributes the recent increase in violence to the effects of 10 years of war, poverty and lack of work opportunities. Zoltán Dévári, spokesman for the Association of Hungarians in Vojvodina (VMSZ), blames inter-ethnic tensions on the widespread relocations of the Milosevic era, which were intended to populate Vojvodina with Serbs.

Incidents following radical’s victory Dévári also points to incidents that took place shortly after the Serbian Radical Party won the popular vote in the last general election. That night, a statue of Matia Gubac, a Croatian national hero, was torn down, Hungarian and Croatian cemeteries were desecrated, there were street fights and anti-Hungarian graffiti proliferated, says Dévári.

“The government is also responsible for the situation in Vojvodina,” claims the Serbian HHRC in a recent report. The report points to the police, who HHRC charges fail to make arrests in such matters, as well as the public prosecutor, who does not file charges against perpetrators. The HHRC report blames both sides for encouraging violence.

In contrast, Ljajic, the Serbian minister for ethnic minorities, says that 70 percent of perpetrators have been arrested, and that criminal procedures have been initiated in 50 percent of cases.

Police procedures relating to violence against Hungarians, however, have also been criticized by the Hungarian government. Critics claim that police do not take these cases seriously, and that they cover-up such incidents.

It is true, however, that the Serb police force is almost uniquely made of Serbs in Vojvodina, with little minority representation. That situation came about naturally, says Dulic, as Serbians tend to be more attracted to the profession, while ethnic Hungarians or Croats are not. Many politicians have made attempts to rectify the situation with little results, he adds. It is hard to judge how acute the situation really is in Vojvodina. Similarly, walking down the streets of Budapest, it would not be hard to find similar anti-Roma or anti-Jewish graffiti. In France, also in the last six months, scores of violent acts have occurred against Jews. Inter-ethnic conflicts can be found throughout the EU.

At the same time, those in parts of the former Yugoslavia, where ethnic-based war was a reality for over a decade, and where governments are still not stable, and the exaggerated Radical Party can win an election; every act of violence against a minority suddenly becomes more frightening.