Belgrade  - A day before the International Roma day, some 40 Roma aimed to spend another night outside Belgrade's city hall in an ongoing drama after their "unhygienic neighborhood" was torn down.

Roma families living in cardboard slums in the posh New Belgrade district were evicted from their houses last weekend and their homes - located in front of the new buildings built for the participants of the upcoming International Student Games - were torn down.

After the Roma had spent a night in the open, the city officials and Roma representatives agreed on a move to several housing containers located in the village of Boljevci on the outskirts of Belgrade.

The residents of Boljevci, however, on Monday burned one empty container and threatened road blocks in demanding that the Roma be located elsewhere.

Belgrade media on Tuesday warned that there is a very small step from burning empty container to burning an inhabited one. Belgrade mayor Dragan Djilas demanded quick police action and condemned the attacks on the Roma.

While the police were investigating, the question of where the Roma were to be housed remained unresolved.

Serbia's Roma population lives off collecting paper waste and want to remain in the city, arguing that in Boljevci, there is nothing for them to collect.

Of the dozens of families whose houses were torn down, only a few Roma children went to shelters in Belgrade, while the rest remained out in the open in front of the city hall.

"We don't have anywhere to go. If we did, I wouldn't sleep here," said one of the Roma in front of the city hall.

But the issue was also stirring resentment among some members of the Serbian public.

While there are those who want to help and believe that the officials handled the problem of "unhygienic Roma settlements" badly, there are also those who were offended by the fact that Roma were demanding that the city should provide them a place to live in downtown areas.

"I also don't have a flat of my own," one angry Serb citizen was quoted as saying. "How would you feel if I've built a cardboard house right in the town square and called it my home, and when you decide to tear it down, I demand an apartment in city center?" (dpa)