Dodik: Relocating the memorial plaque to Serbian soldiers is an attempt to revise history

Relocating the memorial plaque to Serbian soldiers who perished in the First World War in Kosovo, at the cemetery in Pristina, is an attempt to revise history, the President of the Republika Srpska, Milorad Dodik, stated to Kosovo Online.

"The relocation of the memorial plaque is a revision of history. As far as I know, in 1914, before the Great War, Germans and Austro-Hungarians did not live there. How come now they have a monument? However, this is nothing new. A high-ranking official from the German Government came to me, requesting the establishment of a cemetery for deceased German soldiers on Mount Kozara. What are German soldiers doing on Kozara? Serbian soldiers did come to Germany - yes, but as prisoners and in camps, where they were killed", Dodik emphasized.

He emphasized that, although they thought they were strong, they could not rewrite history.

"You were occupiers, you killed half of my people in the First World War, and in the Second, you continued to finish it off. How dare you try to revise history? Why do you expect us not to speak up about it? What kind of monument do you want? Of course, Kurti will do it. But in Serbian lands, we are to blame because we don't want to make a monument to occupiers who killed us on Mount Kozara, allowed the Independent State of Croatia to pick up 80,000 of my compatriots and slaughtered them during the German Hitlerite state, and the Ustasha state, over half a million. Now, to make a monument. You won't find a conversational partner in me for that. You can impose sanctions as much as you want, but you will never get it, and of course, Kurti will do it, but it's a revision of history", Dodik underlined.

He reminded that Germany had attacked Serbia in the First World War and killed half of the male population, or 36 percent of men.

"Do you know what their command did here - they ordered, since the Serbs were a people who exclusively used copper utensils and cutlery, to collect all of it and send it to Germany. Do you know how much you looted us, what you took away from us? Did you pay compensation? What do you want from us now? Now you want us to make monuments to your occupiers on our land - that's too much", Dodik stressed.

He said he did not accept those monuments for all the killed and asked why such a monument was not made in Auschwitz or Mauthausen, and at many other places of suffering.

"You don't even remember to mention that we were mass-murdered there. Until recently, I didn't know that 5,000 Serbian soldiers were killed in Mauthausen during the First World War. I knew about the victims of the Second World War. Wherever you look, 5,000 killed. In Doboj, it's the first camp the Austro-Hungarians made, where they imprisoned 15,000 people, a third of them Serbian children. Do you want a universal monument there too? You won't get it; we will make our monument to the victims, not the criminals", Dodik concluded.