Wednesday, May 4, 2005

Delegations from every region of ex-Yugoslavia, except Kosovo, visited Josip Broz Tito’s grave in Belgrade on a 25th anniversary of his death. Tito, the lifelong president of Yugoslavia from 1953, died on May 4, 1980 and was buried in the “House of Flowers” in Belgrade.

World War Two veterans, as well as youngsters, carrying Yugoslavian flags, laid down flowers on Tito’s grave.

Two Macedonians, a 59-year-old Stojanche Kostovski and a 21-year-old Goce Velkovski, marched from Skoplje, Macedonia to Belgrade, Serbia to visit Tito’s grave, covering around 463 km in 13 days.

B92 quoted one of the visitors, Miloica Ruži?, as saying “While Tito was alive I had no democracy, but I had money and a passport. Now I have democracy, but also an empty stomach.”

A visitor from Vrbas said “Many go to monasteries and churches, but I came here to find peace.”

NGO “General Consulate of SFRY”, from Tivat, Montenegro, published an obituary in major Montenegran daily newspapers, containing Tito’s photography and the text: “Quarter of a century without you – a whole century backwards.”