Vučić Drops Alleged Coup Plan After Calls From European Leaders, Report Says

Serbia’s Aleksandar Vučić was prepared to challenge his parliamentary election defeat through violence before intervention from European leaders helped avert a confrontation, according to a report by The Times citing politicians and a former senior police commander.

The allegations center on a security mobilization in Belgrade on October 25, when Vučić’s ruling bloc lost its parliamentary majority to a student-led opposition movement. His office has rejected suggestions that the deployment was intended to overturn the result.

Thousands Allegedly Mobilized in Belgrade

Spasoje Vulević, a former commander of Serbia’s Special Anti-Terrorist Unit (SAJ), told The Times that police and groups of civilians had been positioned in the capital in preparation for a potential confrontation.

“He sent 4,000 police officers and 3,000 thugs to the center of Belgrade to protect the regime on Sunday. I am 100 percent sure that he planned to refuse to recognize the results.”

Vulević, who had previously been removed from his command after declining to follow orders during protests, described a security buildup around Pionirski Park and a nearby pro-government encampment known as Ćaciland.

According to the report, black-clad men assembled in groups of 20 to 30 while uniformed gendarmerie personnel occupied positions in the area. Streets were closed and some public lighting was switched off.

The deployment reportedly ended around 9:30 p.m., as Vučić publicly acknowledged that his electoral alliance had been defeated.

European Calls Preceded Concession

Vulević attributed the reversal to intervention by senior European political figures rather than pressure from Serbia’s police leadership.

Radomir Saičić, a prominent candidate on the victorious Student List, separately alleged that plans had been prepared to challenge the outcome if the electoral margin proved narrow.

“They had a plan to overturn the vote with brute force if the result was close, but I have information he got many calls from the police and others which changed his mind.”

Saičić said Vučić was warned that a confrontation could have serious consequences for him.

The Times also cited Sandro Gozi, a member of the European Parliament and leader of the European Democratic Party, who said diplomatic channels had circulated warnings about the possibility of an attempted power grab.

Among those reportedly involved in efforts to persuade Vučić to concede was Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s former prime minister, who lost office in April after 16 years in power.

Orbán’s alleged role remains unconfirmed. Vučić subsequently acknowledged receiving a telephone call from him and raised the prospect of a meeting in Belgrade.

He also referred to contacts with French President Emmanuel Macron, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and European Council President António Costa.

The precise content of those conversations has not been established.

Alleged Strategy to Challenge the Vote

Rade Đurić, a lawyer with the Independent Journalists’ Association of Serbia, outlined a possible sequence in which Vučić could have contested the result.

The alleged approach involved raising electoral irregularities, demanding another vote and using anticipated street protests to justify further intervention.

Such a confrontation could then have provided grounds for annulling the election, according to Đurić’s account.

The claims have not been independently substantiated by documentary evidence. They rely on testimony from political figures, a former police commander and accounts of security deployments around the capital.

Student List Secures Parliamentary Majority

The October 25 election delivered a decisive result against Vučić’s Serbian Progressive Party and its United Serbia alliance, ending more than a decade of political dominance.

The Student List secured approximately 52.7% of the vote, equivalent to around 2.26 million ballots, and was projected to win between 140 and 141 seats in Serbia’s 250-member parliament.

Vučić’s alliance received roughly 39.2%, or between 1.67 million and 1.68 million votes, translating into approximately 103 to 104 seats.

Turnout approached 69%, among the highest levels recorded in Serbia since the early 1990s.

The opposition’s margin of approximately half a million votes gave the Student List an outright parliamentary majority, allowing it to form a government without coalition partners.

The movement emerged from nearly two years of student-led demonstrations following the November 2024 collapse of a railway station canopy in Novi Sad that killed 16 people.

What began as protests over the disaster developed into a broader challenge to corruption and the country’s political institutions.

Vučić’s Office Rejects Allegations

Vučić’s spokeswoman, Suzana Vasiljević, denied that the security presence in Belgrade reflected preparations to retain power through violence.

She told The Times that police had been deployed because authorities anticipated possible attacks or unrest involving demonstrators.

Vučić had acknowledged the election defeat approximately 90 minutes after polling stations closed, although he accused independent media, unnamed European governments and what he described as an American political establishment opposed to Donald Trump of supporting a campaign against him.

He subsequently signaled his intention to remain politically active despite the loss.

“I will never leave Serbia. From freedom and from prison ... From tonight, we start preparing. We are going to defeat them.”

The allegations of an aborted coup remain disputed. While the scale of the electoral defeat and reported diplomatic intervention have been identified as possible reasons for Vučić’s concession, no independently verified evidence establishes that an order to overturn the result by force was issued.