Demonstrators protest Jared Kushner’s plans to transform former army HQ bombed by NATO into luxury hotel and shopping site.
Thousands of people have taken to the streets in Serbia’s capital Belgrade to voice discontent over a luxury real estate project spearheaded by Jared Kushner, the son-in-law of United States President Donald Trump.
The protests took place on Monday in front of the country’s former army headquarters, which were destroyed in a US-led NATO bombing campaign in 1999 as part of the Kosovo war, and are now being leased by the Serbian authorities to Kushner’s Affinity Partners investment firm, so they can be transformed into a high-end compound.
“It is the 26th anniversary of the NATO bombing. And we protest because this building has been given to someone to make profit,” said Ognjen Pjevac, a 20-year-old University of Belgrade student. “But it should remain here as it is a testimony to NATO aggression.”
Protesters demanded that the site, comprised of two buildings designed by Serbian architect Nikola Dobrovic that were damaged by NATO’s bombing of what was then Yugoslavia, be reinstated as a heritage site and that plans for the development project be scrapped.
Serbia’s architects, engineers and opposition parties have opposed the government’s multimillion-dollar contract with Kushner, which includes a 99-year lease on the prime land in the heart of Belgrade.
The demonstration was the latest in a series of massive protests against the…
