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The Government of the Republic of Serbia

In the service of citizens

Memory of victims inseparable part of Serbian state, national identity

21 October 2011

Kragujevac, 21 Oct 2011 –A traditional anti-war event “Great school lesson” was held today in the memorial park “Sumarice” in Kragujevac with a memorial service and the laying of wreaths, marking the 70-anniversary of a mass shooting of innocent civilians in World War II.

Boris Tadic

Serbian President Boris Tadic said on this occasion that the memory of victims which the Serbian people suffered in the 20th century binds it to overcome the historical and current political and ideological disagreements.

It also binds the Serbian people to build a civil and tolerant society on the ideals for which many Serbs gave their lives.

He underlined that great human victims are built in the foundations of the Serbian statehood and that historical memory of those victims is an inseparable part of the Serbian state and national identity.

The event in Sumarice commits the Serbian people never to forget all killed civilians and insurgents, members of the Partisan and Ravna Gora movement, but also the victims of the Red Army who participated in the battles for the liberation of Serbia, Tadic concluded.

The memorial service was held by Bishop of Lipljan Jovan, and the wreaths were laid by President of Serbia Boris Tadic, Prime Minister Mirko Cvetkovic, First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Interior Ivica Dacic, Deputy Prime Minister Verica Kalanovic, Minister of Foreign Affairs Vuk Jeremic and Minister of Education and Science Zarko Obradovic.

Wreaths were laid by Minister for Human and Minority Rights, Public Administration and Local Self-Government Milan Markovic, Minister of Labour and Social Policy Rasim Ljajic, Speaker of the Serbian Parliament Slavica Djukic-Dejanovic, ambassadors of Germany and Russia to Serbia Wolfram Maas and Alexander Konuzin, Mayor of Kragujevac Veroljub Stevanovic, delegations of the embassies of Montenegro, Belarus in Serbia, delegations of sister cities of Kragujevac and of the Kragujevac First Grammar School.

The memorial park “Sumarice” was built in 1953, at the place where German soldiers executed several thousand citizens of Kragujevac, men, women and children on 21 October 1941.