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| Ultra-nationalist demo in front of Slovenian embassy |
| 16 February 2008 | 21:42
| Source:
B92 |
BELGRADE, LJUBLJANA --
Several ultra-nationalist groups organized a demonstration in front of the Slovenian embassy today.
 | Protesters carry a banner reading, It Will Remain Ours (Tanjug)
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Several thousand of their members and activists gathered to protest a decision taken by the European Union at midnight yesterday to send its mission to Kosovo despite protests from Serbia.
Slovenia is holding the six-month rotating presidency of the EU.
MUP's regular and riot police were securing the demonstration that blocked the traffic in downtown Belgrade this afternoon. The protesters broke through the cordon several times, but no incidents were reported.
They sang Vidovdan, the popular, highly emotionally charged song dedicated to Kosovo, carried banners, shouted slogans, including, "Kosovo is the heart of Serbia", and read out a protest letter.
"At this fateful moment for the Serbian nation and state, the organization that you preside over, acting directly against the interests of Serbia and the Serb nation, has a clear intention to illegally take part in a secession of our sovereign territory," the letter, addressed to the Slovenian embassy, read.
"We demand from the Slovenian companies that are doing business in the Serbian market to, considering the profits they make thanks to citizens of a country whose territory their government is snatching, speak out about this policy," the letter said.
Earlier in Ljubljana, Slovenian businessmen and managers inadvertently answered the protesters' calls, when they sent a letter to the Slovenian government.
For the second time in as many months, they warned Foreign Minister Dimitrij Rupel that "hasty recognition of Kosovo" may jeopardize their business operations in Serbia, Russia, and some other countries.
The letter, signed by Gorenje CEO Franjo Bobinac, was sent on behalf of 1,100 Slovenian managers.
"Thinking that the Slovenian economy is robust and that it can take new punches in the southeastern markets is at this point, when we have internal economic problems as well, dangerous," the letter warned.
Serbia's ambassador to Slovenia, Predrag Filipov, spoke for the local media in Ljubljana today, and said that he would "regret it if Slovenia were to recognize Kosovo's unilateral independence."
"Slovenia has every right to do so, if it believes this is the proper thing to do," Filipov said, but continued that, the relations between Belgrade and Ljubljana would suffer, with Serbia undertaking measures, "from diplomatic to economic".
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