Today, the President of the Republic of Serbia, Aleksandar Vucic, attended the central manifestation dedicated to the celebration of the Day of Serbian Unity, Freedom and the National Flag on the Sava Square.

"Your Holiness, Distinguished Members of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Mr. Dodik, Distinguished President of the Republic of Srpska Ms. Cvijanovic, Distinguished President of the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia Mr. Dacic, Distinguished Prime Minister of the Republic of Serbia Ms. Brnabic, Your Excellencies, Honorable Fathers, Dear Friends,

In June and November 1911, King Petar I Karadjordjevic handed over 51 regimental flags to his army.

None, I repeat none, of those flags was captured, which is a precedent in the history of modern warfare.

The heroes who were entrusted with the task of taking care of those flags, went through all the battles of the Balkans and the First World War, and on this very day in 1918, storming under those flags, they started to break through the Thessaloniki front. Glory to our great, Serbian heroes!

To our ancestors, the heroes of Kolubara, Cer, Kumanovo, the bearers of Karadjordje's star and the Albanian monument, the Serbian tricolor, red-blue-white, was bigger and more important and more difficult than life, because it warned them that Serbia's freedom has no price or alternative. That is why the flag bearers died, but the flags survived.

Because of them, because of all the others who gave their lives under that flag, under that name, for that glory, today we celebrate the Day of Serbian Unity, Freedom and the national flag, perhaps our most important holiday, which clearly tells us who we are, where we come from, and where we are going to.

It is a holiday of our identity, one in which language, culture, tradition, religion are united, but also the values ​​on which the whole society is based on, the values ​​that make a country civilized, organized, able to remember, but also to know what and why to do.

The date we have chosen, September 15, is the date of the breakthrough of the Thessaloniki Front, the day on which, together, lie our pain and our glory, which form the first part of Renan's definition of a nation, according to which it is based on common suffering, past, but also a common plan for the future.

On September 15, 1918, the only plan was freedom, to which Serbian troops rushed with the famous order of Zivojin Misic: To death, just don't stop! Forward, to the homeland!

That day was the first in a series of the same plebiscites, at which, regardless of the bloody price, we chose, again and again, Serbia and its freedom.

Even today, that is why it is important that, celebrating all the sacrifices, every drop of blood they shed, every bone they sowed, we adopt our new plan for the future in another plebiscite. The one in which we will stand under the same flag, knowing that it is the flag of freedom, and the flag of peace, but also the flag of the future.

The flag of our unity in order to preserve our identity and the right to be what we are, one and the same people, who do not want to take anything from anyone, to endanger anyone, but only to obtain for themselves the same right that they recognize to others. The right to a name, history, culture, language, religion, tradition and the right to exist.

It is the right to dignity, the right to remember, but also the right to what no one else can force us to do, and many are still trying, unsuccessfully - the right to decide for ourselves when and what to forget.

To ourselves and to others.

Not everything has always been quite bright throughout history, and most often towards ourselves, sometimes towards others, but, at least in this area, there is no nation that has gone through so much darkness, a grave one, a nation that has made so many sacrifices to see light and became a nation, free.

What we will forget from all that, and many things we have to, just so that we do not live forever in the past, can only be our choice, and not anyone else's decision.

And let it be immediately clear, this flag, all those who lie under it and because of it, the flag of our suffering, the flag of our bones, our pits, camps, children they took from us, we will certainly never forget and we will carry it with pride.

In it, and that is another important lesson that we have to learn, are all our meaningless divisions, all the failed dreams we dreamed, every mistake we made, but what is important in that is that, even such, our flag represents that unity which is based on the fact that we are not perfect, that we are different, but also that we know that the beauty of unity, the beauty of the flag, is precisely in that.

That is why our red-blue-white tricolor is not a call to unanimity, but quite the opposite, to keep all our differences under one, the same flag.

Under the symbol of freedom, identity, existence, the right to life, because those are the conditions for diversity.

Slaves are all the same, enslaved. Free people are different, because they are free.

And that is something that must apply to all people in the Balkans, regardless of where they live. To be free, to the same extent, with the same rights, with their language, religion, culture and tradition. 

And it is not a special Serbian world, which they accuse us of, it is simply the world of the free, the world of those with their own name, with the right to say it loudly and without consequences, always, and in any place.

We will never apologize to anyone for the Serbian tricolor again. We will wear it with pride always, and everywhere. For us, there is nothing more important than the unity of our people.

And that, in our opinion, must apply to all peoples in the Balkans, without any exceptions, and especially without constant attempts to allow someone, Serbs, above all, sometimes a name, but also to add a stamp of guilt to that name. 

This holiday of our unity and freedom, this flag of ours, also has that role, they are proof that being a Serb does not mean being guilty, it does not mean carrying the burden of condemnation, but, on the contrary, they say that pride goes with that name. 

Pride because of Misar, Deligrad, Cele Kula, and Takovo, Kumanovo, Milos, Djordje, Mihajlo, pride because of Kolubara, Cer, Kajmakcalan, pride because of Peter and Aleksandar, all lives given for one beautiful, the most beautiful attempt of all anti-fascists to preserve freedom in that most difficult time, but also because of the martyrs from Prebilovac, Jadovno, Jasenovac, which we must never forget again, as we have forgotten for 70 years.

And that's us. That's Serbia. It is a new Serbia, a different Serbia, a proud Serbia, which never asks for anything and which will never beg, which just wants to have rights, just like everyone else has, and nothing more, but nothing less.

It is the language, our Serbian language, the language of Mesa Selimovic, Ivo Andric, and Milos Crnjanski. It is the culture we have created, it is a faith without hatred, it is our being, it determines us and makes us worthy people.

This, in the end, gives us the strength, the teaching, that in this century, the foundations of which are in our hands today, we seek peace and discover our strength, greatness, in life, in what makes it better, in work, in great endeavors, making roads and bridges, in connecting, in factories, new hospitals, in knowledge and faith to be able, we can, equally, or more than all others.

And just as we are proud of our ancestors who gave their lives for freedom, so tomorrow our descendants should be proud of us, who teach them how to live for freedom and how to live in freedom.

And we need to teach them how to remember, and how, only by their own will, they are forgotten. How dignity is earned and how the foundation is respected.

And the foundation is that name, Serbia, under which so many unknowns are buried. And that our flag, in which they weaved their lives, to remain recognized. And glory, Fatherland, which sees, hears and helps its children, wherever they may be.

The foundation is also this holiday, the holiday of our identity, our history, but also our differences, which, again, give glory and pain in the past, and a clear plan for the future.

And I want to say a big thank you to our people in the Republic of Srpska, I want to say a big thank you to its representatives who are here, I want to say a big thank you to our people in Montenegro and their representatives, to those who are not ashamed to say they are Serbs, I want to say a big thank you to our martyred people in Kosovo and Metohija, their representatives, who are here with us tonight, but also to say a big thank you to all those who today were not allowed to display their Serbian flag because of the threats of their regimes in the region, to say thank you to them, because I know that their hearts are here tonight, with us and beating for our, for their Serbian people.

And let me finally say that what I will do, as much as I can, with all my strength, with all my heart, with all my soul, for as long as I have left, I will lead Serbia to be even stronger, to be able to help the Republic of Srpska, never touching the rights of Bosnia and Herzegovina, to help our people in Montenegro, and in every place, and to protect every Serbian man from persecution, so that we will never see Jasenovac, Jadovno or Prebilovci again, neither the Storm, nor the Flash, nor the 2004 pogroms. And that is our vow!

Long live Serbian unity, our freedom and our red-blue-white tricolor! Long live the Republic of Srpska!

Long live Serbia! "

Source / Photo: Presidency / Dimitrije Goll