Tour to Strasbourg: Students in Vienna welcomed as Olympic winners

The correspondent of Berlin's Tageszeitung from Vienna reports that on Monday evening in the Austrian capital, hundreds of voices chanted: "Pump! Pump!"

About eighty cyclists, at most, were welcomed there students, who drive to Strasbourg, the media writes, and reports Deutsche Welle.

The slogan with which they were greeted, the newspaper writes, calls "to maintain the pressure on the Serbian leadership. Under the leadership of the students, protests against corruption, nepotism and the authoritarian rule of the Serbian president have been taking place for months." Aleksandar Vučić. "

It was cold in Vienna, so about two thousand people welcomed the cyclists with a red carpet, even though they were about four hours late. "I have never experienced something like this before," said Ivan Pokornik, one of the cyclists.

"Two-thirds of the population is behind us. The authorities cannot win and they know it," Pokornik told Tageskeitung.

There were many Austrian newspaper reporters on the spot, who are reporting their impressions. "At the finish line, the cyclists fell on each other's chests with relief. Many lifted their bikes into the air," writes the ORF public service portal.

Vladimir (23), one of the cyclists, told them: "We want to inform Europe about the situation in Serbia."

"I expect that changes will happen in Serbia soon"

The newspaper Standard writes that the geographic goal of the tour is Strasbourg. "The essential goal is to draw attention there and throughout Europe to the protests and demands of the movement. Because, until now, the European Union has mostly refrained when it comes to showing public solidarity with the movement."

The reporter also talks to lawyer Vladimir Beljanski (55), who also rides a bicycle in the group. He says that the lawyers are with the students, but that the rest of the judiciary is also "revealing courage".

"I see that the judges are slowly waking up from a long lethargy. I expect that changes will happen in Serbia soon," he says, before heading to the improvised stage where the "winners are announced."

Kronen Zeitung writes that the Serbian diaspora from Vienna welcomed the cyclists "like Olympic winners" on Maria Theresa Square.

The journalist talks to Petra (19), one of the cyclists: "Tens of thousands of people want to return to Serbia under one condition: That something changes in Serbia."

Cyclists continue towards Salzburg. After Munich, Ulm, Stuttgart and Karlsruhe in Germany, they should arrive in Strasbourg on Tuesday.