Switch to Desktop Site  Serbia's Police Charmed As Protests Stay
Peaceful  About these ads  Serbia's feared riot police deploy
silently like dark storm troopers, linking their shields
together, streetlights glinting off rain-swept helmets,
truncheons ready.  A mob of whistling and dancing pro-democracy
protesters advances, with a counter assault driven by blaring
rock music. Marchers file within inches of the wall of shields
as they are turned back. But smiles flicker across the faces of
some cops as they are called to join the protest.  In a brave
display that dissipates more of the policemen's menace, some
women go further: They brandish lipstick, painting riot shields
with hearts and arrows like Valentines. One kisses the clear
plastic shields, leaving the red imprints of her lips for the
fidgeting troops to ponder.  "We will win, because they are with
us," she says. Peering over the edge of one shield, she asks a
charmed policeman who tries to hold back a smile: "You are,
aren't you?"  Demonstrations agai