The Serbian state leadership boycotted a reception given by the French ambassador in Belgrade to mark France's national holiday, because Serbia had not been invited to the Bastille Day parade in Paris, while Croatian President Ivo Josipovic attended as a guest of honour and Croatian troops marched in the parade, the Blic newspaper said on Tuesday citing an unofficial source in the Serbian government.
"When the news of the celebration was broadcast on Sunday, showing the President of Croatia, Ivo Josipovic, as a guest of honour and members of the Croatian Armed Forces parading by, the Serbian state leadership decided to boycott the celebration," Blic said, quoting an unnamed Serbian government official as saying that "Serbia deserved a place in that parade a hundred times more than Croatia."
The newspaper said that the Serbian Ministry of Defence had initially planned to issue a statement to express its protest, but eventually abandoned the idea. It said that at the reception given by the French ambassador in Belgrade there had been a conspicuous absence of Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic, Prime Minister Ivica Dacic and First Deputy Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic, noting that the highest state official to attend the reception was Parliament Speaker Nebojsa Stefanovic.
"Serbia bled in the First and Second World Wars and was France's ally, and where was Croatia at the time?" the government official told Blic, speaking on condition of anonymity. When the interviewer remarked that it was a matter of protocol, that Croatia was a member of NATO and had just been admitted to the European Union, whereas Serbia, as a militarily neutral country, should not be interested in participating in a parade with a NATO power, the government official said: "NATO has nothing to do with it. It did not exist either in the First World War or in the Second World War."
Former Defence Minister Dragan Sutanovac said he had tried to arrange the participation of Serbian troops in the parade, but had failed. "It is not scandalous that we were not invited, but it would be an honour if they invited us," he told Blic.
The former Ambassador to Paris, Predrag Simic, said that Croatia had been invited because it had recently joined the EU and "there is nothing insulting to Serbia in it."
The French Ambassador to Belgrade, Francois-Xavier Deniau, gave a reception on Sunday evening to celebrate the French national holiday, Bastille Day, which was attended by over 1,000 guests. On the same day in Paris, about 800,000 people watched the traditional military parade involving about 4,800 soldiers from many countries, including 75 from Croatia.
