Vučić concedes defeat to student-led movement in Serbia snap elections

Aleksandar Vučić has conceded defeat in Serbia's snap parliamentary elections, ceding power to the Student List, a movement that grew out of nearly two years of street protests against his rule.

"It is clear that we have lost these elections," Vučić told supporters after a vote sample projected his Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) would win 105 seats in Serbia's 250-member parliament, against 135 to 140 for the Student List.

Voter turnout reached its highest level in more than 30 years.

The student movement emerged after 16 people were killed when a canopy collapsed at a train station in the city of Novi Sad on 1 November 2024. Protests expanded into a broader wave of unrest before coalescing into the Student List political platform, which campaigned on tackling corruption, depoliticising public institutions and restoring citizens' rights. The movement was led during the election campaign by Ilija Srdanovic, a professor at the Faculty of Medicine in Novi Sad.

Vučić, who led the SNS and had shaped Serbian political life for more than a decade, had referred to demonstrators — who included university professors, doctors and workers — as "blockaders" and accused them of seeking to destabilise the country.

A former ultranationalist who later cultivated ties with the European Union, Russia and China, Vučić co-founded the SNS in 2008 with Tomislav Nikolic after a split from the Serbian Radical Party.