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A defaced poster of Aleksandar Vucic, leader of the right-wing Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), lies on the pavement outside the National Assembly, after he conceded defeat in the parliamentary election in Belgrade, Serbia, October 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Armin Durgut)

BELGRADE, Serbia (Reuters) — Serbia’s Aleksandar Vucic conceded defeat to a student-led protest movement in a historic election on Sunday that ends his long grip on power and heralds a new political era in the Balkan country.

Vucic, a populist and nationalist, has dominated Serbian politics as prime minister or president since 2014.

But he called snap elections in September after almost two years of student-led demonstrations against perceived corruption and creeping authoritarianism, triggered by the deaths of 16 people when a train station canopy collapsed in the city of Novi Sad in 2024.

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“It is clear that we have lost these elections, the Student List has won,” Vucic said in a…