Off the wire
• British Tunisian death toll rise to 30: Media  • Retail sales in Albania rise by 4.7 pct  • Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting opened with attendance of German president  • Egypt court jails 47 Morsi loyalists over violence charges  • "Jurassic World" remains top at box office with half-billion dollar sales  • Floods kill 4 in central Colombia, close roadways  • No conclusive outcome for Greece bailout talks: IMF chief Lagarde  • 1st- LD Writethru: SpaceX rocket carrying unmanned Dragon capsule explodes at start of ISScargo supply mission  • Roundup: Chinese vice foreign minister claims step away from possible comprehensive Iran nuke deal  • ECB to maintain its current level of ELA to Greece  
You are here: 　 Home

Serbia unveils monument to honor Princip, Sarajevo 1914 assassin

Xinhua, June 29, 2015 Adjust font size:

A monument was unveiled Sunday in Belgrade in honour of Gavrilo Princip, Bosnian Serb who assassinated Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian-Hungarian throne in 1914.

The assassination triggered the First World War.

The monument was unveiled by Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic and Milorad Dodik, president of Republika Srpska, entity of Bosnia and Herzegovina who donated the sculpture.

In his speech, Nikolic sharply rejected the idea that the assassination of the Archduke Ferdinand was the reason for the World War One, and described motives of Princip and Young Bosnia, a group he belonged to, as their lust for freedom and opposition to tyranny and slavery.

"Gavrilo Princip and members of Young Bosnia belonged to a generation of rebellious young men which existed everywhere in the world. They were inspired by ideas of justice and the right to freedom, most of all - Russian anarchists and Italian revolutionaries, and thought they were chosen to help the liberation, create a way out of poverty that was almost as slavery and to bring all South Slavic nations together," Nikolic explained.

Bosnia was forcibly annexed from the Ottoman Empire in 1908, and this upset all major powers as well as neighbouring Serbia who had claims towards the territory, but the opposition to Austria-Hungary was dropped the same year. Young Bosnia continued to oppose Austro-Hungarian rule in Bosnia and stood for its unification with Serbia and other South Slavic countries.

Nikolic stressed that by placing this sculpture in the park, Serbia expresses its attitude to the "rebellious angels", adding that Serbia must win new kinds of battles that are led through history books, discussions, media and the internet, and not to allow the twisting of historical facts.

"In so called historical interpretations we read that the Sarajevo Assassination can be directly connected with World War One, and that is an attempt to give amnesty to the occupation and blame the one who got attacked," Nikolic said.

He reminded that the attack of Austria-Hungary and Germany on Serbia in 1914 started the international conflict in which 15 million people in total lost their lives, but he explained it is unlikely that small countries such as Serbia shape the global politics and start conflicts.

"World powers are those who kill people in wars. After the war they unite, become powerful again, and Serbia always gets new conditions, so that it can start at least living normally," he concluded. Endit