Brutal threats against N1 journalists demand an urgent response from the prosecution and state protection
The Independent Association of Journalists of Serbia (NUNS) strongly condemns the brutal threats directed at journalists and employees of television N1 following their reporting on incidents in Novi Pazar. N1 has received four new messages calling for their murder, execution, and extermination of their families. These messages contain open and extremely violent threats that far exceed hate speech and directly endanger the safety of journalists.
One of the messages states: "We all urgently need to go after N1 and eliminate this scum, and burn it to the ground," while another mentions: "You NDH1 sandwich makers are waiting for execution." The most disturbing threat conveys: "…as the obvious organizers of this attempt at civil war, you should be eliminated from the first to the last, along with your families, because you are not even animals but monsters, whose seed should be exterminated at the very root!"
These messages are not only disturbing—they represent a serious and direct danger to the lives of journalists and their families. Their brutality, dehumanizing language, and calls for mass murder demand an immediate and decisive response from all relevant institutions.
NUNS has promptly reported these threats to the Prosecutor's Office for High-Tech Crime. However, we warn that, in past practices, such messages are often dismissed with the justification that they were "expressed in the conditional" or that they do not constitute direct threats. This approach is dangerous and misguided—threatening expressions, even when not grammatically direct, clearly indicate threats of the highest degree and must not be ignored.
It is particularly concerning that such threats are becoming increasingly frequent and arise in an atmosphere further fueled by statements from the highest state officials targeting N1 and its journalists, portraying them as enemies of the state and society. Such rhetoric emboldens those who believe they have the right to call for violence.
We call on the Prosecutor's Office to promptly identify the individuals who issued these threats and to request clarification regarding the meaning and intent of what they have written. The real danger often lies behind seemingly "insufficiently direct" threats.
Once again, we appeal to the Ministry of Internal Affairs to secure the building of the N1 television station and protect all journalists and employees who are exposed to threats.
The safety of journalists is the foundation of a democratic society. Any attack on them is an attack on the public's right to be informed.
Source: NUNS
