Djuric: Serbia paid high price for freedom, we remember our Golgotha and perseverance

BELGRADE - Serbian FM Marko Djuric said on Monday Serbia had paid a high price for freedom in WWI and that, for that reason, "our country and its citizens will continue to protect Serbian statehood, freedom and independence as supreme national values."

"Today, on Armistice Day in World War I, we remember the Golgotha ​​that our country and our people went through during the war years, but also we remember the perseverance and heroism of our famous ancestors, to whom we owe our existence today," Djuric wrote in a post on X.

"The Serbian people was the biggest victim of World War I. The Central Powers, driven by imperial ambitions, tried to erase a small but freedom-loving country from the map. In that war, Serbia lost more than a quarter of its population and 62 percent of the working-age male population.

It will remain etched in the annals of world military history that the courageous Serbian people achieved the first victory for the Allies on Mount Cer.

The devastated Serbian state and the suffering Serbian people rose from the ashes, just like the indestructible Natalie’s ramonda flower, an emblem that we proudly wear close to our hearts today," Djuric wrote in the post.

Armistice Day commemorates November 11, 1918, the day of the signing of the armistice that ended WWI.