Armistice Day and victory of Serbia in the First World War PHOTO

Armistice Day and victory of Serbia in the First World War PHOTO

Armistice Day was established as a national holiday in memory of November 11, 1918, when in the French city of Compiègne, in a special carriage of Marshal Ferdinand Foch at 11 am, an armistice was signed in the First World War, which was in force until the conclusion of the final Peace Treaty of Versailles on June 28, 1919. Serbia paid a disproportionately high price for the victory in the Great War. In the most terrible conflict the world has ever seen, according to the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, Serbia lost 1.247.435 people, or 28 percent of the total population it had according to the 1914 census, or 60 percent of the male population. Of that number, 402.435 soldiers died from wounds and epidemics.

Serbia remembers with pride and reverence hundreds of thousands of civilians and warriors, innocently and heroically killed in the battles for the defense and liberation of the homeland during the four war years - from 1914 to 1918.

Marking Armistice Day both in Belgrade and Bitola

The state wreath-laying ceremony marking the 103rd anniversary of the signing of the armistice, organized by the Serbian Government's Committee for Nurturing the Tradition of Liberation Wars with the Serbian Embassy in North Macedonia, will be held at the Serbian Military Cemetery in Bitola.

The ceremony will be led by State Secretary of the Ministry of Labor, Employment, Veterans and Social Affairs, Miodrag Kapor. In Belgrade, the Day of Reconciliation will be marked by laying wreaths at the Memorial Ossuary of the Defenders of Belgrade in the First World War at the New Belgrade Cemetery. In addition, ceremonies on the occasion of the Day of Reconciliation in Belgrade will be held at the French Military Cemetery, at the Memorial Ossuary of Russian Soldiers Killed in the First World War and at the Commonwealth Cemetery.

The Day of Reconciliation will be marked in the Serbian capital with the exhibition "Days of Ramonda, Resurrecting Gems of the Balkan Peninsula", which will be opened at 12 o'clock in the Botanical Garden "Jevremovac".

At the exhibition, which will be open until November 15, visitors will be able to get acquainted with the biology, ecology and physiology of Ramonda nathaliae and Serbian Ramonda, which will also be exhibited.

Congratulations of the mayor

The Mayor of Belgrade, Zoran Radojicic, congratulated the citizens on November 11, the Armistice Day, and emphasized the importance of remembering the fallen fighters in the First World War.

"Serbia is the country that took the longest part in this war and suffered the greatest casualties in terms of population. We must never forget that. This is also the day when the Entente forces signed a truce with Germany and thus ended the war. The Great War was a conflict that citizens of Serbia must remember and constantly be reminded of. This is an important date for all of us, which is celebrated throughout Europe, but also worldwide," the mayor said.

"Mother Serbia" Award to Djordje Mihailovic

It is planned that the guardian of the Serbian military cemetery from the First World War, Zeitenlik in Thessaloniki, Djordje Mihailovic, will receive the "Mother Serbia" award for his exceptional contribution in the field of relations between the home country and the diaspora.

The award will be presented to Mihailović at the Consulate in Thessaloniki by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Nikola Selaković. The overture for marking the holiday was the honorary firing of ten platoons from the Sava terrace on Kalemegdan.

In Serbia, this day was officially marked for the first time in 2012.

Symbolism of Ramonda nathaliae

The main motif for the holiday emblem is the flower Ramonda nathaliae, an endangered species that grows in eastern Serbia and on Mount Nidze on the highest peak of Kajmakcalan, where the Serbian army under the command of Duke Zivojin Misic fought fiercely against the Bulgarians to create conditions for breakthrough of the Salonica front.

The symbolism of the flower is multiple, both because of the habitat and because of the name. The flower is named after Queen Natalija Obrenović, and it is also known as the phoenix flower, because even if it dries completely when watered, it can come to life, which symbolically indicates the resurrection of the Serbian state from the ashes after the First World War.

The motif of the ribbon of the Albanian Commemorative Medal, which is above the flower, also appears in the emblem.