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The Government of the Republic of Serbia

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Anniversary of bombing of Serbian National Library in WW2 marked

Belgrade, 6 April 2023

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Culture Maja Gojkovic, as a special envoy of President of the Republic Aleksandar Vucic, today laid symbolically a flower and a book at the site of the former National Library of Serbia on Kosancicev Venac.

On this day in 1941, the building of the former National Library of Serbia on Kosancicev Venac, one of the oldest and most important cultural institutions in our country, was burned to the ground during the bombing of Belgrade by Nazi Germany.

On the occasion of commemorating the Day of Remembrance of the Destruction of the National Library, Gojkovic said that 6 April is a tragic and sad day for our culture, history, and the entire modern civilisation.

Director of the National Library of Serbia Vladimir Pistalo recalled that on 6 April 1941, a book collection of 500,000 volumes, 1,424 Cyrillic manuscripts and charters from the 12th to the 17th centuries, a cartographic and graphic collection of 1,500 issues, 4,000 magazine titles and 1,800 newspaper titles were destroyed.

The personal libraries of Vuk Karadzic, Dositej Obradovic, Djura Danicic and Janko Safarik were also destroyed.

German Federal Government Special Representative for the Countries of the Western Balkans Manuel Sarrazin said that what the German government did back then did not only cause human casualties, but was also aimed against Serbian culture, which, he added, is an important part of European culture.