DINAR NOT OVERRATED Radovan Jelašić Governor of the National Bank of Serbia
NEIGHBOURLY SUPPORT H.E. Christos Panagopoulos Greek Ambassador in Serbia
BILLION EUROS FOR SERBIA Daniel Giuglaris Head of the Belgrade Centre of the European Agency for Reconstruction
interviews opinions news comments events www.cordmagazine.com
November 2008 / Issue No. 54 / Price 170 RSD
Looming crisis
Cord, November 2008
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34 ECONOMY
POLITICS & DIPOLOMACY
DINAR NOT OVERRATED
8
Interview: Radovan Jelašić, Governor of the National Bank of Serbia
CURENT AFFAIRS
Hundred Days of the Government, Comment by Dragan Bujošević:
NEIGHBOURLY SUPPORT
14
Interview: H.E. Christos Panagopoulos, Ambassador of the Hellenic Republic in Serbia
BUSINESS ADVANCES
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Serbian Business and EU Integration Conference in Brussels
BREAKING UP THE MYTH
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Montenegro after recognizing Kosovo’s independence
MANAGING DIRECTOR Ana Isaković, a.isakovic@cma.rs EDITOR IN CHIEF Vladan Alimpijević, v.alimpijevic@cma.rs ASSOCIATE EDITOR Richard Wordsworth, r.wordsworth@cma.rs CORPORATE EDITOR Tatjana Ostojić, t.ostojic@cma.rs ART DIRECTOR Zlatko Jovanović, z.jovanovic@cma.rs DESIGN ASSISTANT Tatjana Radojičić EDITORIAL CONTRIBUTORS Dragan Bujošević, Ljubodrag Stojadinović, Sonja Ćirić, Mirjana Vujović, Ilija Despotović, Rade Ranković, Dejan Jeremić, Mark R. Pullen PHOTO Stanislav Milojković, Časlav Vukojičić, Dragan Milošević, CorD Archive, Fonet TRANSLATORS Snežana Rakić, Milenko Pećanac, Milica Kuburu, Momčilo Drakulić EDITORIAL MANAGER Tanja Banković, t.bankovic@cma.rs ADVERTISING SALES Marija Urošević, m.urosevic@cma.rs, Marija Savić, m.savic@cma.rs, SUBSCRIPTION Maja Reljić m.reljic@cma.rs EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR Sanja Zimonjić, s.zimonjic@cma.rs
4 CorD / November 2008
SOCIETY
BUSINESS & CURENT AFFAIRS
OVER A BILLION EUROS FOR SERBIA
18
TOGETHER BY CHANCE
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60
Interview: Daniel Giuglaris, Head of the Belgrade Centre of the European Agency for Reconstruction
REGIONAL PLAYER
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Interview: Roman Glaser, CEO of Perutnina Ptuj and Topiko
CULTURE
BOOK CITY
56
A WORLD ON A SHEET OF PAPER
60
Social responsibility of companies
COMMUNICATION IS THE RESPONSIBILITY
52
Diane Cromer, communications specialist in business of Serbia and USA
GENERAL MANAGER Ivan Novčić, i.novcic@cma.rs FINANCIAL DIRECTOR Ana Besedić, a.besedic@cma.rs PRINTING Politika AD DISTRIBUTION Futura Plus CorD is published by: alliance intrenational media Knjeginje Zorke 11b, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia Phone: +(381 11) 308 99 77, 308 99 88 Fascimile: +(381 11) 244 81 27 E-mail: cordeditorial@cma.rs www.cordmagazine.com ISSN no: 1451-7833 All rights reserved alliance international media 2008
Interview: Dusan Petricic, illustrator and cartoonist
A JOURNEY THROUGH TIME AND HUMAN VALUES
64
CSR AMONG SERBS FOR THE FIRST TIME
30
Belgrade Book Fair
Interview: Goran Marković, a director
SOCIETY
LIFE WITH STASI
67
Exhibition on the East German secret service
FRIGHT NIGHT
80
Halloween
TRUFFLES ARE NOT PROFITABLE
86 87
Large mushroom exhibition in Belgrade Restaurant Review – Iguana at the Corner
LEISURE & LIFE STYLE
COOKING ON MT. ATHOS
76
Traditional recipes from a holy sanctuary
OUR DAILY BREAD
78
Timotije - Tima Simic, Tito’s baker
COMMENT
Vladan Alimpijević, CorD’s magazine Editor-in-Chief
Crisis Looming
The global financial crisis has been met with mixed feelings in Serbia: fear that it would affect our every day lives, coupled with a mean spirited rejoicing because the ‘West’, and particularly its leading light – the U.S. – is going down.
T
he government has been trying to convince us that the fact that Serbia is underdeveloped, excluded from global trends and has a central bank that exercises restrictive policies is enough to ensure that we are defended from the tide of shocks and bankruptcies that have been spreading from New York to all corners of the globe like concentric circles. Proponents of a so-called command economy say that the way in which the Western countries reacted was a commendable form of nationalism and political control over the economic course. However, I am afraid that rejoicing over the ‘collapse’ of the U.S. is a bit premature. I also fear that the notion that Russia is somehow far removed from the tremors on the global financial market is unrealistic. As usual, we have simplified the whole situation in traditional Serbian style. Even Minister Dinkić is advocating a theory that now Serbia will grow more important in the eyes of the world; that capital will flee an insecure and overpriced Europe in favour of a stable and cheap Serbia. The only thing that Minister Dinkić has failed to explain is what is actually cheap in Serbia? Is it energy; real estate; capital; labour, or just government? If there were a referendum on whether or not to end the world, Serbs would probably vote in favour, saying: “Yeah, provided they abolish visas for us so we can witness Armageddon with our own eyes.” Capitalism is usually ruthless. In Serbia, we are still dreaming a dream of a paradise where houses, meals, and holidays are dished out for free. We still feel like the leaders of the third world – the world of freedom, joy and progress. Hence, here the capitalist crisis is viewed as part of the ‘ship bearing gifts’ myth of South-sea islanders, who believed that pale men would come with a ship bearing everything that they needed. However, we still cannot make up our minds whether this ship is coming from Washington or Moscow. The world needs to go bust, because it has been so unfair to Serbia. There is no doubt that 18 years after the end of one party system, 13 years after the end of the civil war, nine years after capitulation under NATO bombardments, eight years after the 5th October uprising and two years after the demise of Slobodan Milošević, Serbia’s image in Western countries remains bad. Is this image undeserved? Yes, probably, particularly when we compare ourselves with our neighbours. Why do people then find it strange that Serbia would rejoice about the problems of the West? Serbia’s elite and laymen alike agree that Serbia should join the European Union. This crisis came as a blessing in disguise. The only problem is that the wave of crisis swept the world from San Francisco to Vladivostok, taking a longer route via Europe. 6 CorD / October 2008
It seems that the authorities were right – the crisis would not be felt that much in Serbia. Only its consequences will. In order to get out of the crisis, we have two scenarios – white and black. According to the white one, the West will overcome its financial problems and recession. In the new cycle, companies will multiply their capital and repay their debts to banks. The banks will buy their freedom from the state and consumers will be given their money and living standards back. According to this scenario, the state and supranational institutions will retain some control over the global financial system, while several banks and insurers will go bankrupt, a few large corporations will change owners, but the system will remain the same. According to the black scenario, after the recession the world economy will go through a depression and history tells us that the only way out of depression war. Financial sector problems will transfer to the real sector, where, according to Marx, an added value is created. Amidst hardship and hunger, the fight for resources (water, food and energy) will become fiercer. This, in turn, will lead to a global war. According to this highly unlikely scenario, the system also remains the same. If the system remains the same, Serbia’s position in the world will not change, i.e. we are still going to be at the bottom of the table. The current coalition came to power because it promised the nation that it would lead it to Europe. Even if Euro-sceptics in Serbia are not that vocal, the prevailing opinion about us joining Europe is that of an arranged marriage. They don’t like us, we don’t like them, but we want to ride the same train. Why? Because there are benefits waiting for us! Nothing has been immoral so far. Mutual benefit has always been a good enough reason to join forces or do business together. The problem is that our notion of Europe is so negative, i.e. the same as the EU countries have of us. Every time an EU member advocates Serbian interests, Washington and Brussels are sceptical about it. It seems like both the Government and President don’t take this matter seriously enough. They think that Kosovo is the breaking point and that, speaking long-term, we are going to show the world that we are the ‘good guys’ after all. The only unknown is the vision Serbia has. If we are no longer that enthusiastic about joining Europe and achieving a better standard of living, then we should stop waiting for ‘a ship bearing gifts’ to come. We need to make our progress something that our partners are also concerned with, despite the fact that they are richer and more influential than us. In order to make that step, we need a responsible elite with a clear vision guiding the country, instead of a group of accidental associates.
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INTERVIEW
Radovan Jelašić, Governor of the National Bank of Serbia
Dinar not Overrated
The protection of state reserves from the consequences of the world financial crisis; the state budget; battling rising inflation; co-operation with world financial institutions - these are just a few of the numerous activities that Radovan Jelašić, Governor of Serbia’s central bank, the National Bank of Serbia (NBS), has been occupied with over the last few months.
BY DEJAN JEREMIĆ PHOTO FONET
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BS Governor Radovan Jelašić accuses analysts of giving incorrect information and of causing citizens to withdraw their saving deposits from banks, by which they lose rates of interest that they would otherwise receive. He compared the analysts who cause citizens to withdraw their savings with wailing women, insisting that “none of their catastrophic prognoses will come true” and citizens who withdraw their money will only suffer losses. According to the finance ministry, the laws that would enable an increase in the guarantee of savings deposits should be on the agenda of the Serbian parliament in midNovember. Governor Jelašić wonders if these analysts will reimburse citizens for the 12 to 13 per cent of lost income per year that they will suffer, taking into consideration Euro zone inflation of 3.6% and the savings interest rate of 10 per cent per annum. Accordingly, withdrawing a deposit of €10,000 will result in said citizen losing €100 on a monthly basis. The governor substantiates his assertions regarding the stability of the Serbian banking system by referring to the details of Deutsche Bank’s analysis of the possible impact of the world financial crisis on the countries of central and eastern Europe, which was declared on 15th October. As part of that analysis, Serbia was ranked second of 26 countries in terms of foreign currency reserves and savings and, according to the
rated as vulnerable,” the NBS governor added. Governor Jelašić has called on banks not to misuse the present situation by increasing interest rates retroactively. He added that black sheep are being separated from the rest of the fold now and that clients will remember which banks have acted correctly and which haven’t. The governor underlined that the NBS expects commercial banks to continue approving loans.
At this moment the World Bank, EBRD and ECB should show their true colours and prove that they support their country-shareholders adequacy of banks’ capital, it was ranked first and the most financially stable. “These results show that risk in Serbia is much lower than in Hungary, Bulgaria, Croatia and Baltic states which have been 8 CorD / November 2008
You travelled to Washington to attend the annual assembly of the IMF and the World Bank. How do these institutions rate the economic and monetary system of Serbia?
Unlike domestic “analysts” and constant critics, in the report the IMF published after the visit of its mission in September the NBS received full support for the monetary policies it had been carrying out. The main issue that the IMF warned about referred to the question of whether, and to what extent, already over-pressed monetary policies could compensate for both internal and external challenges that the international financial crisis brings with it. What do the World Bank and IMF suggest and are there any new arrangements in sight? In accordance with the situation globally, suggestions are being amended on a daily basis; the amount of money being pumped into financial systems is constantly increasing and so far taboo topics, such as private ownership of the financial sector or
ratings of balance categories on the basis of market prices, are no longer considered taboo. One thing is certain: the universal cure for all of these challenges has not been found by anyone yet. I had an opportunity to talk in person to Mr Stroskan, head of the IMF, and ask him if he has enough staff members, because there will be an increase in the number of countries, like Iceland, Hungary or Ukraine, requesting an urgent financial support programme from the IMF, as well as of those that ask for the programme due to the economic reforms their governments are ready to carry out. Unfortunately, that proved to be the case only two weeks after the IMF assembly. Countries are quickly looking for a firm anchor for their macroeconomic policies in the shape of arrangements with the IMF. I do not wish to sound malicious, but I must remind you that if the suggestions of the NBS had been followed and implemented Serbia would have now had an advantage over others in regard to the creation of a new arrangement with the IMF. Of course, it is not too late even now, and the programme with the Fund equates to less turbulence for our macro-economy amid the current global financial instability, as well as an improvement of the country’s reputation from the aspect of monetary value and interest rates. Serbia expects a loan from the World Bank to fund the completion of Corridor 10 routes through the country. Could the economic crisis affect the amount of that loan and how do the World Bank and the IMF see the world crisis? At this moment the World Bank, EBRD and ECB should show their true colours and prove that they support their countryshareholders not only in good times but also in bad times like those currently being endured. Besides, that is precisely why these institutions were founded. If Serbia proves responsible and establishes a new programme with the IMF, we can count on more money from the World Bank too, which, by the way, does not change retroactively approved conditions and interest rates, while the amount of money can be increased. For years, the NBS has had restrictive monetary policies that have been nega-
tively viewed. Under what conditions would you decrease banks’ obligatory reserves? The precise parts that were viewed negatively are now actually being lauded because the policy has proved to be one of the key anchors at a moment when we’re lacking an arrangement with the IMF, and the moment when there is an internal lack of political stability. The National Bank took more measures towards the end of last week, measures through which the banking sector’s solvency has been increased. Additional measures will be taken in co-ordination with fiscal policies and depending on the stability of the financial sector.
To what extent has the new government co-ordinated its moves with the NBS during its first 100 days? Co-operation with the government has been good, but that does not mean that our remarks are reflected through concrete moves, such as a decrease of the deficit or expenditure. The government’s task is to govern, while the NBS can point out conse-
Radovan Jelašić and Diana Dragutinović You have been critical of the rebalance of the budget. Has the government contacted you in connection with the 2009 budget and what specifically will you insist upon? The 2009 budget requires a 180 degree turnaround in relation to this year’s rebalance. If responsibility for the future of the country is not shown now, and if it is not proved by the budget that will be near to
Unwilligness to Listen
I
a balanced one, Serbia will have a hard time. If the budget deficit is similar to this year’s there will not be a programme with the IMF and I daren’t wonder what impact that would have on our macro-economic stability.
do not wish to sound malicious, but I must remind you that if the suggestions of the NBS had been followed and implemented Serbia would have now had an advantage over others in regard to the creation of a new arrangement with the IMF. Of course, it is not too late even now, and the programme with the Fund equates to less turbulence for our macro-economy amid the current global financial instability, as well as an improvement of the country’s reputation from the aspect of monetary value and interest rates.
quences and take precautionary measures. That is not a desirable role, because when the situation worsens the National Bank cannot withdraw and say “we warned you on time”. Rather, it has to take part in saving and repairing the affected stability. Which will have the decisive influence over forming next year’s budget: reason or political promises?
No Great Indebtedness
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erbia is not too indebted as a state. However, private debt has significantly increased over the last few years – though neither the state nor taxpayers guarantee that debt. That is the risk of enterprises, banks and private investors. CorD / November 2008 9
INTERVIEW
Everything will be shown through the level of the budget deficit, and more reason means less deficit. Not only that, it also means proof of responsibility and readiness to finally sacrifice current spending for the following two or three years for the longterm benefit of the country. Macroeconomic policies will be sustainable if the country receives direct investments of €3 billion. How is it possible to achieve that, considering that the world economic crisis is set to continue? Much more active lobbying will be needed on both state and bilateral levels. I hope that Fiat’s investments will encourage other multinational companies to invest in Serbia. As for privatisation, it is necessary – unless a sale is possible – to complete the reorganisation and preparation of these enterprises during 2009, for privatisation in 2010. I hope the unfavourable circumstances on the international market will not contribute to our reorganisation of these enterprises. What impact will the world financial crisis have on Serbia? It is quite certain that there will be fewer loans and that they will be more expensive, because all capital has become more expensive. What is more important than that is how much money there will be at all, as even more expensive money is better than no money at all. Citizens make me less worried about what will happen than loans to the economy. I actually worry where the economy will receive enough support, bearing in mind that the country itself is already paying margins of three to four per cent. The real question is to what extent economic growth will be affected, if the total economy receives loans with double figure interest rates and there are not enough of them. If we do not succeed in finding enough capital from abroad, and based on the increase of domestic deposits, the question would arise as to what our anchor is from the aspect of macroeconomic policies, while commercial speculators and debt traders could start creating chaos for Serbia. To what extent can the NBS intervene financially without affecting foreign currency reserves significantly? Both as a man and as a governor, I am a great miser, and in these turbulent times I think this characteristic of mine should be made even more popular. As a citizen I would only be worried if I saw that the National Bank spending foreign currencies reserves in order to maintain a particular level of value. However, the National Bank is not, and will not be, doing this, as we will be entering a period of great suspense in the coming weeks, during which only high 10 CorD / November 2008
will see that the dinar is rated alongside all other currencies.
World Crisis Ramifications
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t is quite certain that there will be fewer loans and that they will be more expensive, because all capital has become more expensive. What is more important than that is how much money there will be at all, as even more expensive money is better than no money at all. Citizens make me less worried about what will happen than loans to the economy. I actually worry where the economy will receive enough support, bearing in mind that the country itself is already paying margins of three to four per cent.
foreign currency reserves will provided the necessary stability. At what price is the NBS protecting the value of the dinar within the weak economy of Serbia? The NBS is not protecting any level of value, which it has proved over the last few days. What we did do was to prevent serious oppressions that were occurring over the course of a single day. Could the real price of the dinar be achieved on the world’s monetary markets?
How would you rate the stability of banks in Serbia? The banking sector in Serbia is a few times more solvent than those of countries that are currently pumping thousands of billions of dollars into their systems. All of those who know our financial system “admit” that fact. This is a result of the restrictive measures that the National Bank started taking even before the world financial crisis broke out. Of course, we have serious challenges ahead of us, just like many other countries, but unfortunately we have something else too and that is a weakness to cause ourselves much bigger problems than there are objective reasons for that, by stirring up public negative psychosis and fears from the past. Some media, so-called “analysts” in Serbia and irresponsible politicians are working on that. Are we too indebted as a state and as individual citizens? Serbia is not too indebted as a state. However, private debt has significantly increased over the last few years – though neither the state nor taxpayers guarantee that debt. That is the risk of enterprises, banks and private investors. As for citizens, they were the first to realise the seriousness of the time approaching us, hence their debts are decreasing – with the exception of mortgage loans. Whether the citizens of Serbia are too much in debt or not will depend on economic perspectives, first of all on keeping stability of prices and macroeconomic stability, maintaining existing job levels and creating new ones. Inflation is significantly higher than was initially projected? The National Bank has been leading restrictive monetary policies since the beginning of the year, while many other countries only started doing that after they had faced the world financial crisis. The future of inflation levels will depend on the 2009 budget decisively, as monetary policy has
The banking sector in Serbia is a few times more solvent than those of countries that are currently pumping thousands of billions of dollars into their systems This story about world and domestic markets is only discussed in circles that do not understand at all how capital is traded in the 21st century. Just as the florin is used as the currency of first instance in Budapest and the kruna in Prague, the dinar is used in in the same way in Belgrade. As for the rating of our currency, one should take a look at websites of some central banks and you
to receive the necessary help of fiscal policies through that budget, because there isn’t much room to extinguish inflationary fires by monetary measures: these fires are a result of overspending. Please let me repeat that next year’s budget has to make a 180 degree turnaround in terms of expenditure appetites, in comparison to the rebalance of the 2008 budget.
COMMENT
Hundred Days of the Government
Together by Chance
The key problems of Cvetković’s government is that they don’t look like a team that has a clear vision and they don’t seem to be able to wake the dormant energy within citizens
It appears that the government’s ‘marketing’ plan was to ratify the Stabilization and Association Agreement with the EU, the gas deal with Russia and the resolution on continuing the state policy towards Kosovo. It was thought that it would be enough to maintain the preelection state of raised hopes and expectations. The whole business turned sour, perhaps because it suited the government to allow the opposition to obstruct the work of the Parliament so the voters would once again see the ugly face of radicals first and foremost. The vision of the work to be done should have been something a bit more tangible than the ‘five key elements of the government’s programme’ which Cvetković listed in his expose: European future for Serbia, non-acceptance of Kosovo’s independence, strengthening of the economy, social responsibility of the government and the fight against corruption and crime. Does anyone know HOW the government is strengthening the economy, HOW it is more socially respon-
The government could have shown its vision and energy the easiest in the example of, what some call, ‘the fall of capitalism,’ that is, the onset of a global recession
BY DRAGAN BUJOŠEVIĆ
T
he Prime Minister gave the Government an A+, the opposition gave it an F and thus the story of its performance in the first one hundred days of its mandate ended without any serious and expert discussion. It probably couldn’t have happened anyway, because a hundred days is not a period in which one should measure the score of a government. They are a gift to the government from the opposition which gentlemanly says that it will not attack during that period. The government in Serbia cannot expect such a gift, quite the opposite, the opposition continuously launched attacks and obstructed the work of the Parliament at the same time, proving its own power and the Prime Minister’s impotence. The opposition and the media are the ones who imposed this evaluation of the government in the first place. The former did it to mask their own uselessness, the latter because it was easier to do this than to investigate into the details of the contract with Fiat, consequences of budget rebalancing, arguments between the ruling parties as to which company they would ‘rule’… It is easy to notice the differences between Mirko Cvetković and his predecessors Zoran Đinđić and Vojislav Kostunica. It’s unlikely that any Prime Minister will have Đinđić’s energy and vision. They seem unique. Cvetković failed to the possible: he didn’t convince anyone that he had a vision of his government’s tasks, nor that he could raise the much needed hope. 12 CorD / November 2008
sible than the previous ones apart from a single increase in pensions, HOW it intends to fight crime and corruption. The government could have shown its vision and energy the easiest in the example of, what some call, ‘the fall of capitalism,’ that is, the onset of a global recession. Instead, it took 30 days for the Prime Minister to show up with the promise that the government would guarantee savings deposits of up to €50,000 and repeat what some ministers had said that the global crisis would only mildly hit Serbia, but that it would not shake it. Josep Lloveras, head of the European Commission delegation, seemed much more convincing when, a few days later, he said that Serbia would feel the consequences of the crisis, not as much as the developed countries, but it would feel them. Instead of giving the government an ‘A+’ at a press conference, Cvetković could have used that opportunity to face the nation with the threat of a ‘black hole’ in world finance and to communicate the measures through which the government was trying to protect the poor citizens of Serbia, most of whom have salaries insufficient for a dignified life. Although it’s certain that the Serbian government can’t know more about the dangers of the ‘black hole’ than Stiglitz (not sure if this is the guy, I kind of took a guess with the spelling), Obama, Putin, Sarkozy… it is still not an excuse for their inarticulate speech and not waking the energy within the citizens who are being held in lethargy by a long string of defeats and punishments which most of them consider to be over the top and unjust. The government didn’t even use four of its best results to show that it’s competent and that it is accomplishing the ‘key elements of
Members of the Government meet members of the international business community in Belgrade the programme.’ The ratification of the SAA was throuwn into the background by the fact that the EU still has it on hold because Ratko Mladić is still not in Scheveningen. LDP, without whose votes the government would have got stuck several times in the Parliament, named precisely this agreement as the gevernment’s greatest failure even though it was beneficial to the citizens the way it was because the car dealers had to start offering their cars free of customs. In its mor radical form of criticism, LDP will claim that the government is incapable, even unwilling, to arrest Mladić and Hadzić. As time goes by, there are more and more those who are convinced that Radovan Karazdić’s arrest was not a success of Cvetković’s government, but a gift from the former head of the secret service Rade Bulatović (or part of a trade deal with him) and that its new chief still hasn’t got onto Mladić’s trail. Mlađan Dinkić complicated the whole story with the gas deal with Russia for no reason, enabling the opposition to present the government as an opponent of ‘the deal of the century’ with Moscow. And even after the deal went through in the Parliament the opposition continued to accuse Boris Tadić and the government that they had cancelled the signature which he as the Serbian president had put on that contract before the elections. This episode showed that either Cvetković isn’t really bothered by his ministers speaking out on their own or that it is impossible to control Dinkić. Whatever the truth, it is not good for the impression the government is creating. The Minister of Economy claimed for himself the return of Fiat to Serbia, showing to everyone how this ‘miracle’ is his doing and agreeing to share it a little bit only with Boris Tadić. Considering the money that the taxpayers are investing onto the deal with Fiat through the government, it had to be presented as a product of the work of the entire Cvetković’s government. They should have explained to the population, using that example, what it takes for a foreign investment to come to Serbia and at the same time they would have made unrealistic
Đinđić’s goverment
Đ
inđić lost his voice trying to convince every Serbian citizen that he’s a born winner, assuring people that a sunny day comes after a cloudy morning. Cvetković’s government is far from Đinđić’s enthusiasm and it’s much closer to the lullabies sang to the nation by two Kostunica’s governments suggesting to the people to remain calm, that the country would solve their problems when the time comes, but it wouldn’t come before the question of questions is solved – Kosovo. The present government, truth be told, is not as rigid as Kostunica’s and it is ready to do ten jobs at the same time, but it doesn‘t know how to ‘infect’ the nation with good will and cheerful hope.
the promises by the opposition saying that foreign capital doesn’t care about the price as long as it gets on the Serbian market. Cvetković was also nowhere to be seen in the fourth good job by the government, the decision by the UN General Assembly to ask for an opinion from the International Court of Justice on Kosovo’s independence. That job is in connection with the Foreign Affairs Minister Vuk Jeremić and it looks as though it has nothing to do with the government.
The Minister of Economy, Mlađan Dinkić, claimed for himself the return of Fiat to Serbia, showing to everyone how this ‘miracle’ is his doing and agreeing to share it a little bit only with Boris Tadić In a certain way, it seems as though Cvetković is a chance bystander and the head of a team called government. That is the main difference between him and Kostunica. The head of DSS was the indisputable head of the government. Nobody knew how, for example, Mlađan Dinkić was blackmailing him (one of Kostunica’s associates from the government said in an informal conversation: ‘I’d give everything to see Mlađa blackmail them, because I know how he used to blackmail us’). Every success of the government was credited to Kostunica; it looked as though the ministers didn’t even talk to their wives without his approval. Kostunica managed to impose the idea that the Prime Minister was the person running Serbian politics. When he was the president of Yugoslavia, he tried and succeeded in preventing Đinđić from becoming such a Prime Minister. When he himself became the Prime Minister, he showed the Serbian president Boris Tadić several times whose job it was according to the Constitution to run politics. Cvetković is far from that; one would say that he has no such ambitions. Of course, it doesn’t necessarily have to be a bad thing. The important thing is that the government is operating successfully and that it’s bringing in good results. But, the bad thing is that Cvetković allowed for people to get the impression that his government has no intention of reducing public spending. And that is indeed its greatest failure. The quick budget rebalancing to fulfill the pre-election promises given to senior citizens is considered proof that the government’s understanding of ‘social responsibility’ is going to lead directly into economic irresponsibility, which will then be paid for by all citizens, even those who enjoyed for a while the government’s soft social policy. The last public address by Boris Tadić in which he announced a balanced budget and limiting public spending to 44 percent of GDP reduces the fear of the government’s needless softness on the one hand, but points out its two fundamental weaknesses on the other: it doesn’t seem to be independent and it doesn’t seem to be a team. CorD / November 2008 13
DIPLOMACY
H.E. Christos Panagopoulos, Ambassador of the Hellenic Republic in Serbia
Neighbourly Support
“I am confident that, as Serbia’s path towards the EU continues, at some point in the near future Serbian citizens will no longer be under the obligation to apply for Schengen visas.” BY VLADAN ALIMPIJEVIĆ VLADAN
G
reece is both a Balkan country and an EU member. Since the country became of full member of the then EC (now EU) back in 1981, Greece has enjoyed consistent political 14 CorD / November 2008
stability and development, with economic growth above the EU average since the mid-1990s. This month we speak to outgoing Greek Ambassador to Serbia, H.E. Christos Panagopoulos, about Serbia’s own progress towards the EU and other burning issues.
After the EU summit in Thessaloniki back in 2003, it appeared that Serbia was virtually knocking on the door of the EU. Has that opportunity now passed Serbia by; and could the countries of this region expect the same kind of success and quick development enjoyed by Greece once they become members of the Union? EU integration and the goal of accession is evidently a key issue for Serbia. As you know, there is currently a discussion
within the EU about enlargement in general, as it is obvious that we have reached a critical point regarding the future. Personally, I would not be overly concerned about the final conclusion of the process, as the EU has a long history of overcoming problems and arriving at solutions that achieve general consent. My own country has been one of the most ardent supporters of EU enlargement towards the Balkans, based on our strong belief that this will contribute to the social and economic development of the whole region. Our own experience of participation in the EU has been overwhelmingly positive. Similarly, in our view, all Balkan states stand to benefit from their admission to an organisation clearly recognised as a major political and economic power in the world. More importantly, the EU is a family of nations that embrace the same values of democracy and humanism. Entry into the EU would mean that all the countries of our neighbourhood that respect these values would take their rightful place within this family. Is there understanding in Athens for Belgrade’s official current stance of ’yes’ to the EU and ’no’ to NATO? It is a fact that each country determines its own national priorities. Although several Balkan countries have chosen to combine their Euro-Atlantic prospects, no doubt expecting to multiply their benefits by their participation in both the EU and NATO, the two organisations are by no means interlinked; entry into one organisation does not require participation in the another. It seems certain that the countries which have recognised Kosovo’s independence will not change their stance. Bearing that in mind, how do you expect the issue of Kosovo to be resolved? The decision of the UN General Assembly to request the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice on the Kosovo issue was a significant diplomatic success for Serbia. Greece was one of the countries that voted in Serbia’s favour on this issue, on the basis of our firm support of the rule of law in international affairs. Moreover, we are, in principle, in
favour of mutually acceptable solutions with the primary consideration being the stability of our region. After decades of turmoil, it appears that a solution to the Cyprus problem
recognised solely by its creator, Turkey. In any case, we sincerely hope that talks between President Christofias and Mr. Talat will yield results and the division of the island will finally come to an end. If the Cyprus issue is resolved, Turkey’s path
All Balkan states stand to benefit from their admission to an organisation clearly recognised as a major political and economic power in the world. More importantly, the EU is a family of nations that embrace the same values of democracy and humanism is getting closer. And although Cyprus is an independent state, Greece has always expressed a special interest and shown specific sensitivity to the issue. Can parallels be drawn between Kosovo and Cyprus; and would the resolution of the Cyprus issue bring Turkey closer to the EU? There are quite a few significant differences between Cyprus and the Kosovo issue. In Cyprus we have the invasion and occupation of part of an internationally recognised state by a neighbouring state, namely Turkey. The illegal entity of “The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus” is
KOSOVO
CYPRUS
MACEDONIA
The decision of the UN General Assembly to request the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice on the Kosovo issue was a significant diplomatic success for Serbia.
If the Cyprus issue is resolved, Turkey’s path towards the EU will be facilitated. Having said that, this is not the only obstacle standing in the way of Turkey’s accession…
Our position is wellknown. We are in favour of a name with a geographic qualifier that clearly distinguishes the state of FYROM from Greek Macedonia, applicable erga omnes.
towards the EU will be facilitated. Having said that, this is not the only obstacle standing in the way of Turkey’s accession to the EU: Turkey has a number of other criteria to fulfil, both economic as well as political. How do you view the expanding role of Russia globally, and particularly on the Balkans – where Serbia has become the main partner and ally of Moscow? The ties between Russia and the Balkan countries have traditionally been strong, due to a shared cultural heritage and Russia’s geopolitical interests. This is especially true in the case of Serbia, where we see an even closer co-operation now, most notably in the energy sector and the development of new gas pipelines. How is Greece prepared to compromise over the name of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, FYROM, or does this question go beyond merely official names? Our position is well-known. We are in favour of a name with a geographic qualifier that clearly distinguishes the state of CorD / November 2008 15
DIPLOMACY
previously common queues of applicants. I am confident that, as Serbia’s path towards the EU continues, at some point in the near future Serbian citizens will no longer be under the obligation to apply for Schengen visas. Although our national cultures are very close, there is not much hands-on knowledge of the Greek culture and language in Serbia. It is true that there is a great interest in Greek culture here in Serbia, reflecting the bonds linking our two peoples. I am pleased to announce that a Greek cultural centre (branch of the Hellenic Foundation of Culture) will soon operate in Belgrade. Its mission will be to serve as the main reference point for Serbian citizens wishing to get acquainted with the Greek language and cultural life, as well as to enrich bilateral cultural relations. Will you take any specific image of Belgrade with you when you leave? In my mind, Nebojša’s Tower stands as a powerful symbol of the spirit of unity and brotherhood between Greece and Serbia. As you know, it was in the tower that Rigas Velestinlis, a Greek who envisaged the unification of the entire Balkan region, was assassinated during Ottoman rule. I am proud to say that the Greek side is actively assisting, also with a significant financial contribution, in the restoration of Nebojša’s Tower.
FYROM from Greek Macedonia, applicable erga omnes. Greece has consistently displayed good will and its sincere wish to reach a mutually acceptable agreement with FYROM. However, I am not very optimistic, since lately we have been receiving negative messages from the other side and have noted a hardening of their position regarding several important points. In any case, Greece will continue to work towards a definitive solution of the issue. Serbian citizens have never, in modern history, been able to travel to Greece without a visa, while others from nations with significantly fewer
ties and shared afinities – have enjoyed that privilege for decades. Why is that? As you know, Greece participates in the Schengen system. That means that there is a common European policy that has to be applied by all Schengen states. Greece has always advocated for the liberalisation of the visa regime with all Western Balkan countries, Serbia in particular, as we are very interested in facilitating our Serbian friends who wish to visit Greece. To that end, over recent years the Greek Embassy has taken several steps aimed at simplifying and speeding up the process of the issuance of visas, thus eliminating
PARTING SENTIMENT
A
s my mission here is approaching its end, I am happy for any contribution I have made to further developing the relations between Greece and Serbia. Ours is indeed a unique case of two neighbouring nations continuing their paths through time in the spirit of mutual understanding and appreciation of the traits and interests of each other. 16 CorD / November 2008
What are your impressions of Serbia, the country’s elite and her national interests; and who would you singleout as your favourite personality in Serbia? My impressions of your beautiful country are extremely positive. I have had the pleasure of spending more than three years here and I have come to appreciate the open and lively spirit, as well as the hospitality, of Serbian people. It would be very hard for me to single out any single individual from the many people I have come to know here. I have been privileged to form friendly relations with people coming from different backgrounds, such as political leaders, professors, artists…I will always treasure the good times we had during my stay in Serbia. As my mission here is approaching its end, I am happy for any contribution I have made to further developing the relations between Greece and Serbia. Ours is indeed a unique case of two neighbouring nations continuing their paths through time in the spirit of mutual understanding and appreciation of the traits and interests of each other. The Greek-Serbian friendship is not an abstract notion, but a reality which I have witnessed firsthand, and I am sure it will endure.
INTERVIEW
Daniel Giuglaris, Head of the Belgrade Centre of the European Agency for Reconstruction
Over a Billion Euros for Serbia “I think we have done a lot in order to work professionally with the Serbian authorities.” BY KATE DEBUSSCHERE, TATJANA OSTOJIĆ PHOTO MARKO RUPENA
T
he European Agency for Reconstruction (EAR) began operations in Serbia in late 2000 when it commenced efforts to disburse 1.3 billion euros of non-refundable grants. These funds have financed projects throughout Serbia that have improved infrastructure and conditions in almost all sectors. As the Agency’s work draws to a close, CorD talks to the head of its Belgrade Centre, Daniel Giuglaris, to gain insight into its accomplishments during the past eight years.
This year sees the EAR’s mandate in Serbia draw to a close. In your opinion, what where its biggest successes and failures? We have done hundreds of projects. Over this seven-year period we have signed over 1,500 contracts with companies and suppliers of equipment and services. So, I cannot tell you which project was the biggest success and which was the biggest failure. However, what we can say is that we delivered assistance, which was massive, on time, with quality and with conformity to the policy and relationships between the EU and Serbia. Serbia today is different than it was five or seven years ago, and I believe that we have always followed and anticipated its changing needs. We estimate that one billion IFI loans are directly connected to work done by the EAR, either previously finalised or to be concluded imminently. We have done this by preparing feasibility studies, including the identification of needs, or by providing technical assistance when a grant is in place. The best example of this would be the EIB loan for the rebuilding of the 18 CorD / October 2008
main hospitals, worth 200 million. Both the government and the EIB insist that the EAR made this possible. As for failure, in some cases we could have insisted more on changing the legal and regulatory framework before embarking on restructuring projects. Did you invest the total amount of 1.3 billion euros, and what were your biggest projects? Yes, we contracted all of it. Part of this is still under implementation and part was contracted in the last few months and will continue to be implemented in the next two years. This will not stop, because with the closure of the EAR you have the closure of the CARDS programme, which we implemented. This will be followed by the next assistance programme, which is called IPA, the Instrument for Pre-accession Assistance, which has a similar budget and is managed by the European Commission. At the end of the day, where the procedures are changed you will still have contracted companies who will provide services, equipment and infrastructure. Will different procedures make it easier for the government? The government will have more responsibility, which may mean it will be more complicated. However, I am confident that the government of Serbia is able to adjust. If you could change the funds assigned to certain projects, which projects would be given more and which less? When you are told that there is a broken bridge and you have to repair it, you make a cost analysis and you either pay 45 million euros or you don’t repair it. This was the same for the overhaul of the Nikola Tesla Power Station. The analysts said it would be 53 million euros and we had to do it. We have small projects which have a huge average and with a broad spectrum of activities, so it is difficult to say which projects should have been given more funding and which should have been giv-
en less. What has to be taken into consideration is the policy objective in the medium to long term. So, we had no choice but to repair Nikola Tesla no matter the cost. But, the Nikola Tesla Power Station is now important for Serbia to become an integral player in the electricity mar-
“We estimate that one billion IFI loans are directly connected to work done by the EAR” ket. This allows economies and countries to trade electricity with their neighbours, with the objective of reducing losses and using necessary investments. In turn, it makes Serbia a part of the pan-European electricity market, though it requires a different type of investment. It requires the establishment of an independent regulator, a market operator/creator and the establishment of high voltage lines between countries. That was our latest major project: nearly 30 million euros to connect Serbia to the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and other regions. You took part in the reconstruction of the energy sector, agriculture, health
PROJECTS
TAX
FREEDOM
We have done hundreds of projects. Over this seven-year period we have signed over 1,500 contracts with companies and suppliers of equipment and services.
Improving the functioning of the treasury and the tax administration will improve relations between the citizens and the state, and then improve the management of taxpayers’ money.
Through my experience, Serbia is a country that enjoys the same degree of freedom as the French, British, Germans, Italians, and this, in my opinion, is very important.
system and entrepreneurship. Lately, you have shifted your focus to building institutions and raising their capacities. Could you tell us a bit more about these projects? Yes. All working Serbian citizens are taxpayers and the tax authority is not viewed in the best light by every citizen. However, improving the functioning of the treasury and the tax administration will, firstly, improve relations between the citizens and the state, and then improve the management of taxpayers’ money. This in turn will improve confidence between taxpayers and the state. Those are things we have done by providing the tax administration with a massive supply of computers, technical assistance and the software that goes with it. Secondly, these improvements will develop new procedural systems, and, thirdly, facilitate the training of thousands of tax administration employees. Another sector is the judiciary. We have provided similar types of technical assistance here too, though it is a bit more complicated when you are dealing with this sector. Now a number of courts have in place another system for managing court cases. This makes the system more transparent and enables the authorities to check the status of any case. The computer system makes it easy to see when a case was entered in the machine and when it stopped. So, it is a combination of policy recommendations and technology to fix the system. What about local governments? We started in southern Serbia. We invited mayors to start co-operating with each other on joint projects and initiatives. We provided 10 million euros, and other donors also contributed. We have paired CorD / October 2008 19
INTERVIEW
of the ICTY. It is not within my competence to discuss it, but it is the most immediate one. Could you draw a comparison between the EAR’s activities on the territory of Serbia and in the other former Yugoslav republics? The budget for Serbia is much bigger. The budget in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia is 45-50 million euros. Serbia is 160-180 million euros per year. Then you have different situations between Serbia proper and Kosovo. The general objectives are much the same. When I was in Skopje three years ago I was doing projects very similar to those here. Not as big, less infrastructure. It comes with history. That country had not suffered massive destruction and years of blockades, which had damaged the infrastructure in Serbia. The conflict that took place in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia in 2001 was limited. We still finance projects here to support refugees and IDPs in Serbia, while down south this lasted for only six months.
Favourite project
W
e have been supporting the Yugoslav Film Archive, the Kinoteka, and I think it’s a great project because the archive contains thousands of films, some of which are extremely rare and do not exist anywhere in the world. Many of these films cannot be shown to the public because they are on nitrate film and are extremely fragile. They would burn if they were not stored in a special environment. So, we have supplied special equipment, assistance and training, to restore these films. The installation of the equipment is being finished now. We will soon be able to see films which had disappeared. A potential source of revenue would be to sell or rent out those films to TV companies in Germany, Great Britain and France, and I think it would be good for the public in general in Serbia. To be given the opportunity again to see great personalities and events from the past. So, I like this project because it is very technical, but has a cultural impact which is much broader than just a technical thing. We don’t only do bridges! all the municipalities of Serbia with one another and created a system of screening and selecting projects. While doing this we had in mind the National Investment Plan. We have pooled resources and showed the municipalities how they can attract investments beyond their initial needs by pooling those resources. Special attention is devoted to harmonising Serbia’s domestic regulations with those of the EU. In your opinion, how far is Serbia from harmonising its regulations with those of the Union? Total EU regulations cover 80,000 pages and every year more are added. Judging from my past experience, I can say that the Serbian authorities have a precise grasp of what is required for EU accession. I can’t say that they have applied that or that it is easy to do so in all sectors, because the EU accession process is a long term goal. But, all citizens and local regional sector authorities have their own political goals, 20 CorD / October 2008
which are not necessarily in favour of accession. The EU insists on fair competition and transparency among all companies. Some companies are not so keen to move towards perfectly fair competition. So, it is a political game which is played permanently between national authorities, interested parties, the citizens, companies, etc. It’s not only a technocratic process. There may be resistance inside the member states due to an objective. It is a political process. What do you think is the main ob-
When did you begin your work at the EAR and where were you before that? I came in June 2005. Before Belgrade I was three years in Skopje, three years in Kiev, three years in Budapest, four years in Cairo, four years in Lagos - that was interesting - and four and a half years in Israel. Comparatively, what is the quality and speed at which the transformation process is being carried out in Serbia? Serbia is a country made up of free citizens. They don’t forget to make use of their freedom. People who enjoy this freedom are a minority in this world. The freedom to think what you want to think, to do what you want to do, to conduct your life the way you want to, to marry or not to marry who you want, and not being jointly guided by government and other authorities throughout your life. This is what I call individual freedom, and I believe that a country that has this type of individual freedom is a country that is able to solve its problems. Through my experience, Serbia is a country that enjoys the same degree of freedom as the French, British,
The EU insists on fair competition and transparency among all companies. Some companies are not keen to move towards that. stacle to Serbia’s accession to the EU now? There are many obstacles that we see today or that may not appear until the years ahead because there is a broad spectrum of issues. You’ve heard of the issue
Germans, Italians, and this, in my opinion, is very important. Which projects in Serbia should be given more attention in the following period?
I think that projects devoted to developing the economy are important. Attracting foreign investments is a priority. The next priority is education. We have invested a lot in reforming vocational education and training, but it is only a small part of the whole. Serbia doesn’t have so many natural resources to exploit. So it is important to improve the technical capability of the people. It is imperative to attract investment from western and eastern companies. We have supported the development of the INvetsment and Export Promotion Agency (SIEPA) and many SME agencies, but we cannot go further than that. The EBRD can play that role much more actively and make the country more open for investors. But, investors say that the infrastructure is the main obstacle in Serbia and that a ‘regulatory guillotine’ is needed, because of non-transparent laws, particularly dealing with real estate. Can we change this? All economies in transition have faced this and have had difficulties overcoming it. But it can change. The EU is requesting changes at a high speed, because we started 50 years ago and are telling you to do it in five to 10 years. It’s not that easy to change from one day to the next concerning the property of land. Is there anything you would like to say about the EAR’s achievements, considering that this is its last year in Serbia? I think we have done a lot to work professionally with Serbian authorities. As I said before, our counterparts understand what they can and cannot expect from us. This is why I have enjoyed my stay in Serbia so much, professionally speaking. I have been in countries where it has not been so easy to convince people. In Serbia it was understood that the delivery of equipment is tied to the process of reforming legislation and procedures and this made our projects much more interesting. CorD / October 2008 21
POLITICS
Business Diplomacy
Business Advances
High EU officials and Serbian business leaders gather in Brussels
Opening the recent Serbian Business and EU Integration Conference in Brussels, EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn paid tribute to the efforts of the organisers of this gathering – the first event aimed at taking initial steps towards moving communication between Europe and Serbia out of the political arena and into the domain of real economic problems affecting everyday life
message at home and across the EU”. Forcan’s opening address laid out the topics of the conference: the current and potential impact of EU integration on the Serbian economy and business climate; the role of business in promoting regional and European integration, and the challenges and opportunities for foreign investors in Serbia.
BY CorD
Striding Towards Europe
A
fter months of international activities, Delta Holding’s Milka Forca, with the support of the Serbian Chamber of Commerce, organised a business conference, entitled Serbian Business and EU Integration, which took place at Brussels’ Conrad Hotel on 20th October and brought together leading European decision makers and business people, including 30 leading Serbian CEOs, to discuss in detail the key business and economic issues affecting today’s EU-Serbia relations. The event’s key note speaker was EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn, but 22 CorD / November 2008
the conference also provided a unique opportunity to hear first-hand, from companies in Serbia and abroad, about their perspective on Serbia’s EU integration process and their outlook for the future. Formally opening the conference, Milka Forcan declared the day a “groundbreaking day” because “So far all discussions have focused only on politics, but today, we are talking business.” She continued: “This is the first occasion that leading business people are coming together to meet with stakeholders in order to discuss the challenges that integration places on the Serbian economy. This should send a strong and positive
Addressing the esteemed participants, Olli Rehn, European Enlargement Commissioner, assessed the event as “a positive sign that Serbia is not only willing but is effectively moving towards European integration with confidence and determination.” Reminding participants of his personal stance in favour of the integration of all Western Balkan countries into the EU, Rehn noted that the EU was a factor of peace and stability and that the European integration process is the major catalyst for reforms conducive to growth and prosper-
ity. He went on to add that he believes if conditions are met Serbia could get candidate status next year. “It is my deep conviction that the business community has a central role to play in the realisation of the European perspective of the Western Balkans region. You are the ones that can really push the reforms forward.” Commending the Serbian government’s recent decision to start unilaterally implementing the interim agreement with the EU as a sign of genuine commitment to the EU agenda, Rehn reminded those present that Serbia is a natural spot for investments because it has a strategic location in the centre of the Balkans with a relatively strong economy, a productive and skilled workforce and an infrastructure which is improving.” The EU boasts 56 per cent of the Serbian import-export trade and is home to seven out of the 10 top investors in Serbia, making the EU both Serbia’s main trade partner and the main source of foreign direct investment, but Rehn insisted that, in order for investments to increase, “lowering tariffs is not enough. For any potential investor, a stable, transparent and predictable legal and administrative environment is also crucial when choosing the best investment location. “In many ways, the EU approximation process is also contributing to the improvement of conditions for doing business and making investments in Serbia. Adherence to the EU common values and rules, in areas such as competition, state aid, public procurement, free movement of capital, social rights, consumer protection, or protection of environment, has proved the best guarantee for economic success.” According to Rehn, the most burning reform issue in Serbia relates to the need for a functional judicial system. He explained: “In the legal vacuum that followed the collapse of the former Yugoslavia, corruption, organised crime, tax evasion, financial fraud, as well as a grey economy, emerged as serious problems in all countries in the region, including Serbia. They have hindered growth and foreign direct investments for a long time.” The senior EU official expressed his belief that the Stabilisation and Association Agreement (SAA) will strongly contribute
rule of law and maintaining macro-economic stability are decisive for FDI and are key elements to creating an environment which is truly conducive to economic growth.” In conclusion, Rehn insisted that the European Commission is committed to continuing its supporting for the necessary reforms in Serbia in order to facilitate its accession to the European Union. “But ultimately,” he said, “we rely on you, the economic operators, to promote the respect of those rules in a fruitful dialogue with policy makers and civil society. This is in your
Delta Holding President Miroslav Mišković and EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn direct interest as economic operators and it is in the interest of the Serbian people as a whole. The wider the consensus on EU integration, the faster Serbia will move towards EU membership.”
Lisbon Treaty, i.e. the realisation of adequate economic reforms today in order to ensure the prosperous, fair and sustainable future of Europe and, consequently, of Serbia.”
Further Reform Required
Regional Co-operation Key
Addressing participants in his capacity as president of the Assembly of the Serbian Chamber of Commerce and CEO of food company Bambi-Banat, Miroslav Miletić insisted: “Serbian companies need new space that will lead to EU membership and is de-
In his address, Miroslav Mišković, President of the biggest private company in Serbia and the country’s most successful company, Delta Holding, reminded participants that his was the first Serbian company to enter the EU market, through acquisition of a retail chain in Bulgaria in 2007. “Since then,” said Mišković, we have carried on with investments in Slovenia, where we encountered a good reception as a foreign investor.” Insisting that European trends of the past 50 years should be continuing in the Western Balkans today, Mišković said that “business plays a key role in breaking boundaries and connecting people from the region in their quest for better living con-
“It is my deep conviction that the business community has a central role to play in the realisation of the European perspective of the Western Balkans region.” – Olli Rehn to an improved business climate in Serbia. However, he noted, “the mere signing of the agreement is not sufficient. In the current context of global financial turmoil, where countries are competing for investments even more than before, strengthening the
ernment regarding the unilateral implementation of the SAA, Miletić said that focus should be placed on “the strong continuation of legislative reforms… it is of the utmost importance that this process enters the phase when the certainty of EU membership prospects allow stronger business relations and partnerships with EU companies. In this way we could join our available resources and strengths with Europe and give a small but significant contribution to the EU efforts aimed at realising the objectives defined by the
signed for active and innovative SMEs. He explained: “SMEs take up the major share slice within the Serbian private sector, and such space would be the most reliable guarantee for their sustainability.” Sending a message to the Serbian gov-
CorD / November 2008 23
POLITICS
The Players ditions. In order to achieve this, we praise and support any and all activities that bolster the process of regional integration, especially implementation of CEFTA [the regional free trade agreement] and the activities of Council for Regional Cooperation.” Welcoming the current activities of the Regional Co-operation Council, Mišković said: “as a major regional investor, I would like to draw your attention to the experiences of our company, which have clearly shown that some parts of the region are still burdened with obstacles we have to deal with every day. In that sense, permit me to emphasise that a more direct role of the European Commission in this segment would be of significant importance.” Mišković continued: “Montenegro is a positive example, but unfortunately there are other examples, which I would prefer not to name. However, I am certain that these countries will soon realise that new investors will bring new jobs and improve living conditions for their citizens.” Turning to the new regional free trade agreement, the Delta Holding president said that “CEFTA has set a framework for removing barriers in order to promote economic growth, development and cross-border trade and investments.” However, he noted, “we are, unfortunately, witnessing that effective implementation of this agreement in the participant countries is often heavily affected by everyday politics. We believe that the rules of the European Union 24 CorD / November 2008
T
he conference’s expert panel included: - Miroslav Miletić, President of the Assembly of the Serbian Chamber of Commerce and CEO of Bambi-Banat; - Miroslav Mišković, President of Delta Holding; - Danko Ðunić, President of the Economic Institute of Serbia and the Serbian Business Club; - Sandra Blumenkamp, Representative of the World Bank for South-Eastern Europe; - Goran Pitić, President of the Board of Société Générale Yugoslav Bank; - Arnaldo Abruzzini Eurochambres Secretary General; - Rudi Thomaes, CEO of the Federation of Enterprises in Belgium; - Daniel Gros, Director of the Centre for European Policy Studies. should be applied as soon and as completely as possible across the entire region, especially in light of CEFTA’s implementation. By setting up a separate independent body to oversee efficient implementation of the Agreement, we would prevent the influence of everyday politics from spilling over into the CEFTA pool.” Mišković concluded by reiterating his initial position that “business brings people together and creates a better standard of living. I believe that today’s meeting of the Serbian business community and European Union representatives will send a strong message of support to European integration…”
Bridges of Shared Agendas Danko Ðunić, President of the Economic Institute of Serbia, reminded participants that they all share the same agenda - the development of private business in Serbia. “I want to convey a
clear message that our interests are equal to those of business people in the EU who represent our major economic partners, representing seven per cent growth per annum in addition to foreign investments.” He continued, saying: “It is realistic to expect that domestic savings deposits and investments will become the driving force of economic development in Serbia. European financial institutions are invited to bring their know-how and experience to strengthen the new private sector in Serbia. This will bring new jobs and competition, as well as production and service activities.” Next, Goran Pitic, former Serbian minister for international economic relations and current president of the Board of Société Générale Yugoslav Bank said: “There is no doubt that the EU integration of Serbia and other countries is building different types of bridges – new political, diplomatic, trade, financial, cultural,
sports and academic bridges. We need to enhance these current bridges and increase the flow of traffic in both directions. The more bridges we have, the better we are; the stronger, wider, better and easier the flow of traffic, the happier everyone is.” Continuing his theme of bridging gaps, Pitić said: “For Serbia, other than the free flow of people, there is a set of bridges that define economic connections – trade, commerce, and FDI. Serbia needs three billion Euros annually in order to achieve sustainable growth…we need stronger support from the EU to realise this.” Stressing the need to strengthen regional co-operation on the basis of a level playing field, Pitić said: “there is a needed role of the countries in the region to catalyse support from the EU in order to make this happen. Regional and EU integration will lead to increased competitiveness. We need competitive countries form the region to enter Europe – something regional integration will enhance.” Turning to political issues, Pitić said: “From the foreign investors’ point of view, we need a positive understanding of the government’s implementation of the SAA. We also need the EU to accelerate the process of Serbia’s integration. Serbia is the last among the aspiring countries of the Western Balkans and an enormous economic price is being paid. We must speed up the process of entering contractual arrangements.” Concluding, Pitić insisted that Serbia can definitely absorb more than is currently available: “more funds should come into physical infrastructure and more funds should target assistance to priority infrastructure. Efforts could be gathered in finalising the network through Corridor 10.” Addressing the issue of a crossover between business and politics, Arnaldo Abruzzini, Secretary General of Eurochambres, said: “Business does business, but I believe that business also has the capacity to raise questions sometimes give solutions at the political level which could benefit entire society. If conditions are not appropriate, doing business is difficult. We did a survey aimed at identifying obstacles and improving the business environment in the SEE region, Serbia included. The result is interesting: it is true that CEFTA is functioning to a certain extent, but businesses believe it is not doing enough – particularly the hundreds of thousands of small business who are finding it difficult to do business in the region.” Adapting a famous Kennedy quote, Abruzzini said: “Ask not only what the EU can do for Serbia, but what Serbia can do for the EU. At a time when we know the interest of the EU and decision makers is turning away from the direct interest of in-
Speaking of the importance of the private sector, Abruzzini said: “the private sector in Serbia represents between 55 and 60 per cent. Compared to EU standards this is very low and, accordingly, the liberalisation process should continue. “We need a good representative role to bring the voice of businesses to a government level. We held a huge event that saw local businesses from 27 municipalities gather at the European Parliament to discuss and vote on resolutions, etc. The immediate impact of this is huge because governments and politicians need input and the more we are able to bring solutions, suggestions and dialogue to the political level, the more we fulfil the tasks many businesses would like us to do – making the business environment easier.”
Corporate Governance
Milka Forcan
Successful Gathering
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ilka Forcan: “I received positive feedback after the event from many participants. The conference was a great success and the level of debate was outstanding. I believe that the conference was a unique example of the civil sector contribution in achieving common goals of faster EU integration and increasing levels of regional co-operation. “During times of financial crisis, such as those we are facing today, it is important to have joint initiative and approach among businesses and political-public institutions in order to ease the common burden.” dividual country, there is a second and a third answer: We need to improve the local business environment through a direct link with our governments. Europe can facilitate this. Look at the Internal Market of the EU – we are still implementing this after 50 years. Do not expect miracles from the EU unless your government implements measures based on the rule of law. “From a Europeans perspective, there is a market for goods services and investment. If local conditions are inappropriate, they will become difficult. If not integrated, any given market will be too small to attract interest.”
The World Bank’s Sandra Bloemenkamp called for a greater private sector role that would see businesses communicate with government in order to keep reforms advancing. Insisting that Serbia is doing quite a lot to create a positive business climate, including improving institutions and regulations, she noted that there is a significant remaining agenda for the simplification of business entry and the streamlining of construction permits. The quality of infrastructure, she said, is still important, as is strengthening corporate governance, and improving the legal and institutional framework for competition will remain crucial. Advising on the creation of a comprehensive regulatory framework, she concluded by noting that the small details, “the nitty-gritty” creates a business environment where it is possible to continue private sector growth.” Daniel Gros, Director of renowned think-tank, the Centre for European Policy Studies, said that he is still surprised by the timid nature of steps, especially regional trade integration through CEFTA. “Why not be a bit more bold?”, he asked. “Look for a customs union arrangement; get rid of all regional trade barriers and prepare countries for EU membership. This is better than taking one small step at a time and it is not difficult to do. We already have a blueprint in the EU-Turkey customs union.” Offering his advice in conclusion, Gros said that Serbia should perhaps eliminate transitional conditions that would be immediately operational and would have a strong impact on trade and bring Serbia closer to being a fully fledged membership candidate. Business organisations should put this on the political agenda.” CorD / November 2008 25
REGION
Roman Glaser, CEO of Perutnina Ptuj and Topiko
Regional player “It’s always easier to generate capital by buying a company, while it’s much more difficult to integrate it into the philosophy of another concern.” BY TATJANA OSTOJIĆ
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ince Slovenian-based Perutnina Ptuj took a decision to become the regional producer of poultry and poultry-related products, the company has opened four production facilities – in Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina and Serbia. In addition, Perutnina is also present in eight other countries. This year, the company established subsidiaries in Romania and Austria. According to the CEO of Perutnina, Roman Glaser, for them the term ’region’ covers territories from Munich to Istanbul, as this company sells its products in 21 EU and other countries. We decided to speak to Roman Glaser about the Serbian market and the privatisation of national meat processing company, Topiko.
You said recently that Perutnina is going through a phase of intensive internationalisation of its business operations, and that Serbia will be given priority this year. What is your view of the Serbian market? Our development strategy includes plans to completely cover the region. Serbia is an important part of that plan, since we are talking about a relatively large market with a good geographic position that is well supplied with the primary raw materials. However, the problems we see on the Serbian poultry market are as follows: the market is not properly organised and the so-called ’grey economy’ is still present; meat prices keep on rising month after month and relations between private producers, subcontractors and production organisers are not very good, i.e. they are unstable. I am sure that these things will change for the better in the months and years to come. I have a positive outlook on the situation and believe that Serbia will record exceptional growth in our branch and that the consumption of poultry will grow. Today, 26 CorD / November 2008
it stands at less than 10 kilograms per capita, while in Europe it is 25 kilograms. So, opportunities for growth are huge.
coming years, and that the state and relevant authorities will pay special attention to this problem.
How much of Serbia’s poultry production is under the category of ‘grey economy’? Based on information I received from Serbia, almost 50% of the production. This is an incredibly high percentage. Nowhere in the world did we see such a strong ’grey economy’; the percentage in other countries ranges between five and 15 per cent. I believe that this will be sorted out in the
What challenges did you have to deal with during the privatisation of Bačka Topola-based Topiko? It’s always easier to generate capital by buying a company, while it’s much more difficult to integrate it into the philosophy of another concern – particularly since the Topiko workforce have been living in a sort of grey zone for quite some time. They were not sure how long they would
be employed and that made them feel awkward. Maybe in the beginning they viewed us as a stranger, as somebody who would come in short-term, take whatever was on offer and then leave. Now, after almost a year, when I talk to workers I see that they feel differently. They know that we are serious and that we plan to stay, and they understand that we want to take care of their living standards, as well as that we need them to co-operate with us in order for all of that to be accomplished. On the other hand, Topiko was in a bad shape. It was enduring a financial blockade which cost us €4.5 million to remedy, and we had to resolve this problem in matter of few months. Secondly, Topiko was unviable and had a terrible rating. This was something else that we had to tackle. Thirdly, we had very little time to re-organise Topiko’s technological capacities, production and personnel. Almost all of the employees stayed, with only a few leaving on a voluntary redundancy basis. We brought managers from Slovenia to take charge of applying the know-how and implementing the organisational structure. At the same time, we had to revitalise and restructure the company, since it had lost its veterinary registration number. We got this number back at the beginning of October. To date, we’ve invested around €1.5 million in equipment and we plan to invest an additional €800,000. I am pretty sure that our business partners, customers, workers and associates view us differently as a result of all that has happened. Why did you decide to buy a production company and not go for a greenfield investment? This is really an important question. We were going back and forth between these two options, but we realised that Topiko possessed certain production sections that were really good and that could be adapted to our standards pretty swiftly. Hence, we chose a faster and maybe easier way. I am quite certain now that we made the right decision. According to our loose plan, in the following three years we will invest close to €40 million in all production phases in Topiko, in order to reach a
The factory from which Perutnina’s regional exapnsion began
production level that conforms to our principle. We even expect to start producing some of Perutnina’s brands at Topiko next year. This year, we plan to produce close to 10,000 tonnes of meat and 1,500 tonnes of processed meat, and we’ll import 3,000 tonnes from Slovenia. The next year’s production should be between 22,000 to 23,000 tonnes. In the meantime, we have
HALAL CERTIFICATE
OWNERSHIP STRUCTURE
We have the Halal certificate for all countries. We adhere to the standards of this certificate in Slovenia, Croatia and BiH. All of our factories have it and we are going to bring it to Serbia too. As the producer of poultry and poultry products, Perutnina hasn’t used pig lard for decades, hence these consumers can use our products.
A consortium of six companies bought a 10 per cent stake in Perutnina Ptuj.This means that we have stabilised our ownership structure and protected ourselves from a possible hostile takeover. Agrokor is one of the owners, but this company has very few shares. We have several people from Serbia buying shares in Perutnina Ptuj.
brought four distribution centres in Serbia up to full capacity and I believe we’ll soon start building a modern distribution centre near Belgrade – so we will have made a greenfield investment after all. Do you plan to export products made in Serbia to Russia? At this moment I think that’s too ambitious. We still have a lot of work to do in Serbia. We are planning to prepare the products made under the Poli and Perutnina Ptuj brands for the Serbian market in quantities that will satisfy the demands of the Serbian market. Today, with the capacities we dispose of at the moment, we are not up to the standards of the Russian market and, as I said, it would be presumptuous to talk about it. Let’s wait and see what the situation is like in three years’ time, when we complete our first cycle of adjusting Topiko to our way of CorD / November 2008 27
REGION
they do this, then investors will be more willing to come to Serbia. Also, and this goes without saying, you need a judicial system that is supportive of investments.
The Slovenian town of Ptuj, hometown of Perutnina thinking about structure, volume, and economy. We’ll see what’s going to happen after that. Could Perutnina cover the demands of the Russian market? To a very small extent. During the 1990s we were present on the Russian market as Perutnina Ptuj, but everything was different back then. Genex used to make deals, a sort of swap with the Russian market, which included three or four companies from the former Yugoslavia. So, a single producer was not enough. Back then, with such a large company as Genex having solid relations with Russia, our business with Russia was good. Nowadays we just don’t have that sort of production volume in any of our factories. How would you assess the company’s operations in Croatia and Bosnia & Herzegovina (BiH)? We have been present in Croatia for the past six years and I am quite content with our position there. All of our factories are producing in line with the standards of our headquarters in Slovenia and the perception consumers and businesses have of us ensures that we have a pretty high rating. The fact that we are faring well in Croatia is a result of us having operated there for the past 20 years. It’s been three years since we opened a facility in Bosnia & Herzegovina. I am also satisfied with our standing there. Our growth is good, we are consumer orientated, and we keep our word, ie, to produce good, high quality brands which are already familiar to our consumers. Aside from that, consumers in Bosnia & Herzegovina are quite happy with being able to buy the Perutnina Ptuj quality un28 CorD / November 2008
der the sign ’Made in BiH’. In your view, how open is Serbia to the arrival of companies from the former Yugoslav republics, and vice versa? Honestly, the fact that Perutnina Ptuj is a Slovenian company coming to Serbia has never been viewed as a handicap. On the contrary, the local government helped us a great deal and is still doing so. I am sure that the regional authorities in Vojvodina and Belgrade can assist us in securing everything that our employees need, since we believe that will have a positive
How do you expect the global financial crisis to affect your industry? Food production will never be the same again, especially after last year saw a huge increase in the prices of some products. Currently, maize and wheat are quite cheap, but the price of soya went up sharply for producers like us who don’t use genetically modified soya. I have to say that genetically modified soya will be used less and less. As much as the maize and wheat price went down, the soya went up. Hence, in the price structure of food nothing will change. Secondly, the issue of energy is quite important. The price of energy will go up in comparison to last year and I don’t think we should expect energy prices to go down, because of this financial crisis. The value of capital will increase, well, it already has. In a year and a half the value of capital has increased by almost 100%. EURIBOR is 5.35 today, a year and a half ago it was 2.25. Not only that, there is less money on the market; it is virtually nonexistent. Globally speaking, the production of luxury items is slowing down. The car industry is the first to feel the brunt of this. Volvo has been reducing the number of its employees; BMW is cutting back on production. Other products will follow, since
I have a positive outlook on the situation and believe that Serbia will record exceptional growth in our branch and that the consumption of poultry will grow.Today, it stands at less than 10 kilograms per capita, while in Europe it is 25 kilograms. So, opportunities for growth are huge influence on the economy. We haven’t had any bad experiences. On the other hand, I don’t think that Slovenia is as closed as some people suggest. Maybe it is a bit more difficult to come to the Slovenian market because it is relatively small, the infrastructure is more expensive and things are different than in other countries. I think that most companies are scared that production costs are very high in a country as small as Slovenia. What can the Serbian Government do in order to attract a greater number of foreign investments? I think that the best recipe, and we’ve seen this in one country, is for the government to offer infrastructure for free and reduce the time needed to obtain construction and other permits to a minimum. If
there are quite a few industries that are associated with vehicle production. The construction branch will also suffer. Loans will be difficult to obtain, demand will fall, and with less demand real estate prices will go down. In the end, this will be felt by food production companies, since with smaller budgets, less money is spent on food. Consumers have to eat, but I think that we are going to see two groups here – one which will eat less but better quality food, which is where we see ourselves. The second group will comprise consumers who will eat less and unhealthily. Hence, we are always going to have two consumer levels. Despite all of this, I expect Perutnina to record production growth. So far in 2008 we have recorded a 25% growth in relation to 2007. Our plan for next year is a further 20% growth.
SOCIETY
Social responsibility of companies
CSR Among Serbs for the First Time
One of the most telling things about Serbia’s attitude to business is its attitude to foreign investments. In the beginning, foreign companies were seen as enemies who were trying to take control over our enterprises and as people who would try to corrupt us with their capitalism, and now they are the desire of every unemployed person in Serbia. The word “sales”, has been replaced in our domestic vocabulary with the word “investment” BY MILOVAN MILIČKOVIĆ
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ome of our smaller towns have been granted a lease of new life thanks to the arrival of “the foreigners”. The arrival of a foreign company changes the local environment for the better. Hence the euphoric atmosphere over last months in Kragujevac, due to the arrival of Fiat in
30 CorD / November 2008
Zastava. Their arrival has been an excellent opportunity for locals to learn from their experience. We have learned how to work successfully, how to treat an employee, what competition is and the ways in which it affects the market. However, one thing that is still to be learnt is corporate social responsibility (CSR). Even today some of our domestic companies are
still mistaken in thinking that this is a byword for the head of the business standing in front of the press and publically giving money to charity on behalf of his company. They do not realise that there is much more to it than that. With a few exceptions, press coverage of CSR activities has been limited. Even some of our companies are hazy about the issue. “The very idea of CSR is new to our market, and people have only started encountering it thanks to the arrival of foreign companies” says Ms Nevena Radovanović, co-ordinator for CSR at the cement and aggregate company Holcim. “Up until now the usual terms for corporate altruism have been “sponsorships and donations” – which is a model that has been used by domestic enterprises so far. This is now growing and changing into more socially
Mobile opt for education of the young in the field of telecommunications. EFG Eurobank does its part by renovating parks in towns across Serbia and in Bežanijska Kosa it built a park for children with special needs, named the “Rainbow Colours Park”. Some companies opt for business sector development. For instance, Holcim Serbia is one of the founders of the Forum of Business Leaders of Serbia, the first coalition of socially responsible companies in Serbia, the mission of which is to stimulate the development of socially responsible business practice and to establish lasting and stable CSR in the Serbian business sector. “The idea is that the companies, of which there are currently 14, provide mutual support in applying CSR, exchange information and experiences, and gain opportunity for education and professional improvement, and develop and carry out Corporate Social Resaponibility brings companies closer to communities mutual strategies so as to help a particular sector of society or the economy and responsible ways of doing business.” Ana Krstić, the manager of react successfully to more and more complicated social and ecothe Telenor foundation, is of a similar opinion. “Socially respon- nomic challenges.” says Ms Radovanović. This year, Holcin invitsible business for our company covers a wide range of activities, ed tenders for the first time for their “Partnership for the future”, such as providing care and help to the local community, investing open to non-governmental organisations as well as institutions in the development of our employees, preserving the environment and societies that would carry out their projects in the territory of and finding transparent ways of doing business” says Ms Krstić. Paraćin. Among the projects were activities that would help the “In Serbia we want our projects to help benefit everyone, and to development of the local economy, such as the “business incufind ways of tackling the problems that our society faces”. Soon bator” or special enterprises promotion, for example. “Holcim`s after their arrival in the Serbian market, Telenor started thinking wish is to contribute to the development of the communities where about how to start work in the field of social responsibility. “We decided to establish the Telenor Foundation. The board of directors of the foundation dedicated much of their time to discussions on what three fields the focus should be on and what kind of activ-
With a few exceptions, press coverage of CSR activities has been limited. Even some of our companies are hazy about the issue. “The very idea of CSR is new to our market, and people have only started encountering it thanks to the arrival of foreign companies” ity we should initiate and support. In accordance with those decisions, the Telenor Foundation’s attention is directed first and foremost towards the young, towards their education and professional improvement but also towards socially affected groups and development of culture and art. We think that our art has been neglected too much over the past few years and that generations of artists have been unjustly left out of the global art scene” says Ms Krstic. Apart from Telenor, over the past few years, Philip Morris has invested in art through the Nis Art Foundation and Erste Bank has done so through the Erste Foundation. Most important is the CSR ethos, which is long-term and dedicated. “We care about longlasting effects. We do not want to support a particular project and then forget about it, but instead want to monitor and support it over a long period of time” says Ms. Krstic. CSR is a big part of almost every foreign company in Serbia. They know that Serbia is a country with a lot of problems in a lot of different areas, and which for various reasons cannot always help itself. Companies, then, have a lot of scope for choosing the focus of their charitable work. Some companies like Vip CorD / November 2008 31
SOCIETY
it does business, by creating opportunities for co-operation and communication between the public, business and non-profitable sectors”. An average, uninformed citizen of Serbia may well ask what the point of all this is. Not used to the western way of running business, only recently familiarised with the word transparency, and used to conspiracy theories, such people are often convinced that behind all the supposed goodwill is a new scheme for earning even more money. “Holcim is a company whose aim is to be profitable. We depend on wisely investing now so as to benefit us in the future. Parts of our profits are given to the local community and individuals, and our investments into local community development over the past six years were over 4 million dollars. Where there are problems in the local community, we form coun- The jury is out on whether CSR is merely PR with soul cils to fix them. For us, CSR is not PR, but a way of running a business that leads to economic and social over. Ms Radovanović says the company in Serbia follows the progress, which then brings results for the company itself” says strategy of the Holcim group and global strategies of socially reNevena Radovanović. This is how companies function the world sponsible business. “In other branches of the Holcim group, directions are different because the needs of a community in more developed markets, such as the British market for example, are not the same as those of developing countries, like India for example. For instance, 100 colleagues work in Holcim India in the Holcim Foundation alone, and they are focused on water supply, which is one of main problems there.”
CSR is a big part of almost every foreign company in Serbia...Some companies, like Vip Mobile, opt for education of the young.... And what are the effects of CSR activities? Do they produce results? The Telenor Foundation has organised an exhibition of contemporary Serbian art pieces that was held in the Cvijeta Zuzorić Pavillion. The Telenor Collection, that comprises 150 pieces of art by 46 domestic artists, was formed in co-operation with the independent artistic association Remont. The Telenor Collection is the biggest of its kind in Serbia so far, with pieces of are being bought for anything from 300 to 7000 Euros a piece, an inspiration to those who had worked on the project. “The Telenor Collection was made with the aim of stimulating the development of art production and the art market in Serbia. It is the first serious investment by a company in contemporary Serbian art.” says Ana Krstić. Ms Radovanović cites another example of the benefits of CSR. “With the help of the Regional Agency for Economic Development of Šumadija and Pomravlje we started a programme of responsible restructuring, whereby we tried to advise exemployees of factories on how use their money in the best possible way for them. About fifty employees have been through this programme. It is our great pleasure to see that we have succeeded in helping people in a way that is real, as, for instance is the case is with Boban Nikolić, an ex employee of a cement works, who has been through this programme and is now successfully running his own business.” 32 CorD / November 2008
POLITICS
Montenegro recognises Kosovo’s independence
Breaking up the Myth Why is nobody in Serbia protesting against Montenegro deciding to recognize Priština? Why are Serbs in Kosovo not protesting? Are Montenegrin Serbs more Serbian than their fellow nationals? - Miodrag Vuković BY ILIJA DESPOTOVIĆ
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ontenegro’s recognition of Kosovo’s independence has a much more profound influence than many in the Serbian government will admit. The political consequences of this decision will be evident by the end of this year and in the years to come. Speaking shortterm, the issue of Kosovo could lead to the 34 CorD / November 2008
parliamentary election coming earlier than scheduled (the end of 2009). This new reckoning between political parties in a fight for the state parliament might even occur as early as spring next year. The new ‘Kosovisation’ (a reference to Kosovo’s declaration of independence) of Montenegro, which fell by coincidence on the 20th anniversary of the infamous Kosovo protest rally which resulted in a so-called an-
ti-bureaucratic revolution, is essentially a conflict between two Montenegros which have been in opposition on a multitude of other issues. Now, this conflict has taken a more subtle and deeper turn, going beyond just a politicial or even spritual or national issue. While the ‘anti-bureaucratic revolution’ had a political character and even resembled an ideological discontinuity, the modern day ‘Battle for Kosovo’ is almost a battle between civilizations. This is a ‘battle’ between the primitive political conservatism, the tribal notion of government and state, illusionist mythomania and provincial inferiority on one hand, and the modern, pro-European Montenegro of political realism and
rationalism and national self-confidence on the other. Political analysts, whose observations go much deeper into social and political processes, view the recognition of Kosovo’s independence as an important break with their history of falling in line with Serbia. Still, Montenegrins are not aloof when it comes to Kosovo. A professor at the Podgorica Faculty of Political Science, Srđan Darmanović, was correct when he said that reconizing Kosovo was not easy for anyone, not even the government which made the decision. Prime Minister Milo Đukanović was also right when he warned that Montenegro had paid a hefty price for sticking to its illusions in the past. Kosovo not being a part of Serbia is a political reality and Montenegro, as understanding as it is when it comes to Serbia and its sense of loss, cannot ignore this fact any longer. In light of this the decision was made to recognise Kosovo, Đukanović says. Delaying such a decision would be detrimental to the national and state interests of Montenegro which was not pressurized by anybody into
President Filip Vujanović shakes hands with NATO Sec. Gen. Jaap De Hoop Scheffer the Kosovo issue both politically and spiritually. The country is split in trying to decide whether it should look after itself, and make independent decisions without consulting ‘Big Brother’ (Serbia or Russia). The country
Asked why Podgorica had not recognised Kosovo earlier, when it first declared independence, Đukanović stressed that his government had not rushed into that decision, adding that “it’s always better to admit the inevitable sooner rather than later.” formally recognizing the state of Kosovo, the Prime Minister assures us. The decision was made for practical purposes, meaning prior to the decision that Montenegro would apply for EU membership by the end of the year. It would be rude and diplomatically unfeasible for Montenegro to apply for EU candidacy while not adhering to the EU’s policy toward Kosovo, Đukanović and Montenegrin President Filip Vujanović agreed. However, the other, smaller, politically old-fashioned side of Montenegro spoke up saying that “Kosovo is the heart of Serbia and the Serbian people”, that it is “a spiritual cradle”, that it is “our home”, that it cannot just be “given over to a foreigner” and that “we cannot give up on the High Dečani and Gračanica monasteries”. The Archbishop of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Montenegro, Amfilohije, said in a spirited speech at the protest rally against recognition of Kosovo, that the Montenegrin government should not give up on Metohija, which, militarily and administratively speaking, used to be a part of Montenegro during the Balkan Wars and remained in the Zeta County up until 1945. The President of the opposition party – the Serbian National Party – Andrija Mandić went on a hunger strike over Kosovo, and for days people used to come to see him, which just added to the atmosphere of an emotional and political ‘Kosovisation’ of Montenegro. Montenegro is divided when it comes to
needs to take care of its own interests above all. By making a decision to recognize the independent state of Kosovo, Montenegro distanced itself from the so-called ‘Victim of Mojkovac’ myth - a reference to the battle of Mojkovac of 1915, in which the Montenegrins fought against the Austro-Hungarian army in order to protect the retreating Serbian army as it made its way toward Albania. Only recently have historians started to question whether perhaps Serb forces had already entered Albania while Montenegrins were supposedly covering their retreat. The Montenegrins won the Battle of Mojkovac, but soon after laid down their weapons in the face of the still advancing Austrian army. Not long after that,
they lost their sovereignty, and even today there are those who doubt that this was a mere coincidence. What does Miodrag Vuković, who has been in politics for over 30 years, think about post-Kosovo Montenegro? Montenegro is an organized and democratic state today. The democracy is young, fresh and not approved by many conservative political forces in the country or abroad. Montenegro’s orientation is pro-European. The country served as an example to Europe, when all other regional countries were deemed as a problem. It is the only former Yugoslav republic that did not fight wars and which was considered a safe haven from the bad Balkan politics. For
POLITICS
“Đukanović is a synonym for Montenegro”
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iodrag Vuković entered politics some 30 years ago when he left his position as a university assistant to the professor teaching constitutional law to work for the then Communist Party. He took part in all pivotal political events since 1990. He says that the political ideal that he follows is that Montenegro needs to go back to what it was 150 years ago, to Europe, as an independent country, free of political atavism. He was a close associate of Milo Đukanović. Vuković says that he enjoyed working with Đukanović and compares him to strong political figures that some countries, like England and France, have had in the past. He believes that President Đukanović is a synonym for democratic Montenegro. Vuković adds that when he was a young man he was enchanted with the ideas of anti-fascist resistance and declared himself a Yugoslav until this term became an ‘illusion’, at the end of the 1990s. This is when he turned to Montenegro and the country going back to its roots. Since he’s been in politics for quite some time, Vuković is somewhat wistful when it comes to his university career, but admits that he is not bored with politics. Politics has brought him a lot of friends, and he still keeps up with his friends from the old days. In principle, he is generally a friend to all politically like-minded people but although he does share his political views with many, he is not a friend to all of them. 16 years, from 1990 to 2006, Montenegro fought with its conservative structure, the forces that advocated old ideology and myths, fought with the national feeling of inferiority, and fought the unwanted label of the ‘Serbian Sparta’ by the creators of ‘the Greater Serbia’ back in the 19th century, says Vuković, who is one of the high officials in the ruling Democratic Socialist Party and a close associate of Milo Đukanović, one of the loudest advocates of Montenegrin sovereignty. Vuković adds that the reaction to recognizing Kosovo is actually an outburst of political and civil paranoia, an attempt to stall Montenegro on its European path. The attempt has failed, Vuković says, and points out that the opposition has been discredited along the way. He thinks that Montenegro is not divided as before, but admits that the protest rallies by the opposition parties have shown that the country is still facing remnants of the retrograde political and civil structures. The opposition demands for the decision
to recognise Kosovo’s independence to be declared void and that a referendum should be carried out, and that new parliamentary elections should be held. Vuković is adamant that this will not tolerated. He adds that there is no constitutional basis or political reason for such actions. Following a decision to recognize Kosovo, Montenegro became aware of the harsh reality that Serbia needs to face alone now; that such decisions are to be made according to what is best for individual countries and not out of loyalty to ex-Yugoslav principles. “The decision was hard, since emotions run high when you mention Kosovo”, Vuković says, “but there is no place for emotions in politics”. When asked how Montenegro could convince Serbia that by deciding to recognize Kosovo the country was only helping Serbia, Vuković said: “Serbia needs to open its eyes and resolve this problem in a rational manner, rejecting any stereotypes, illusions and outdated politics.” Serbia did understand Montenegro’s decision, Vuković says, even though the initial reaction by the officials
in Belgrade was to throw the Montenegrin Ambassador out of the country. But that was as far as it went. Vuković is reminded of a statement made by Boris Tadić when he said that evicting Montenegrin Ambassador should be the line that Serbia should not cross when it comes to other sanctions against Montenegro. Commenting on the protests by certain sections of Montenegrin opposition, Vuković says that Montenegro actually doesn’t have a ‘classic democratic opposition’. According to him, this is more of a “classic political destruction of Montenegro which keeps on forcing Montenegro to fight somebody else’s battles, to die for somebody else’s interests, to take care of somebody else’s problems”. Vuković says that the reactions by pro-Serbian political parties in Montenegro are supported by “conservative, nationalist, Serbian chauvinists from Belgrade”. Why is nobody in Serbia protesting against Montenegro deciding to recognize Priština, why are Serbs in Kosovo not protesting? Are Montenegrin Serbs more Serbian than their fellow nationals?
Political blindness
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ontenegrin Prime Minister Milo Đukanović says that delaying recognition of Kosovo’s independence would have been “political blindness”. Đukanović told that the decision had not been conditioned but had been a matter of course.He said that the crucial factors for Montenegro’s recognition of Kosovo’s unilateral independence had been the country’s strategic and national interests, adding that Serbia’s reaction had been expected. “No one asked me directly to do that, but if you want to become part of Europe, you must respect their standards,” the prime minister said, adding that the move had proven to Montenegro’s citizens that he was pursuing a decisive policy. “We had to decide whether to build partner relations with the EU and NATO, or support Serbia’s illusion,” Đukanović said. He said that the harm caused by Montenegro’s decision to recognize Kosovo was “not dominant”, adding that Montenegro wanted good neighborly relations with Albania, Kosovo and Serbia. The prime minister said that relations between the opposition, who were against the decision, and the government were no more jeopardized than they had been after the country’s break-up with Serbia. “There is no question that Kosovo is lost, and on seeing that something is inevitable, even if it’s unpleasant, the serious response of state policy should be to look it in the eye,” Đukanović said. 36 CorD / November 2008
ONE-DIGIT INFLATION BY THE END OF THE YEAR
9-month results of Piraeus Bank Group
CONTINUED GROWTH TREND
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iraeus Bank Group, despite the world financial crisis, has recorded excellent results in 9-month period in 2008. Key indicators of successful business are total assets of 52,859 billion euros at the end of September 2008, i.e. an increase of 31% compared to the relevant 9 month period in 2007, when assets were 40,420 billion euros. Net profit reached 441 million euros, which is an increase of 23 % compared to the relevant period in 2007, when it was 359 million euros. In the past 12 months deposits were increased by 48% and reached 31,6 billion euros, and loans were increased by 38%,
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erbian Prime Minister, Mirko Cvetković said yesterday that the endof-the-year inflation rate would be onedigit, adding that there was a good chance of the inflation rate ‘not going above 8%”. At a conference in the Serbian Chamber of Commerce, the Prime Minister said that the inflation was not as high as it had been anticipated in the first half of this year and added that during the first nine months of this year the inflation rate was 6.9%. Cvetković also said that he expected for the realistic growth of the GDP to be close to 7% at the end of the year.
IMF: SERBIA’S GDP WILL GROW BY 6%
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russels – The International Monetary Fund forecasts that Serbia’s GDP will grow 6% in this and the following year, after the last year’s GDP recording a 7.1% increase. At the forum entitled Regional Economic Perspectives in Europe for October, which was held in Brussels yesterday, the IMF said that this year’s inflation rate in Serbia would be 10.7% while the next year’s would stand at 7.5% (last year’s inflation rate was 6.8%). The Fund also said that comprehensive activities that were carried out in order to alleviate the global financial crisis would not affect Europe that badly, despite a noticeable slowdown in the economy. Approving the global response to the financial crisis
38 CorD / November 2008
and adding that the biggest risks had been avoided, the Fund called for the coordination in such issues to be more harmonized. “In Europe, the crisis served as a catalyst for advancing cross-border coordination and we encourage European leaders to continue with the orchestrated and coordinated action for resolving the crisis quickly”, said Acting Director of IMF’s European Department, Alessandro Leipold. This year’s economic growth recorded by the developing European economies, including Serbia, will be 5.7%, the IMF says, while next year this growth is expected to reach 4.3% and maybe even more. At the same time, when it comes to the developed European economies, IMF envisages stagnation - a 1.3% growth this year and only 0.2% next year. With regards to the inflation rate, the Fund says that its growth will slow down and the developed economies will experience an average 3.5% inflation rate this year and 2.2% in the following year. With regard to the developing European economies, the situation is somewhat different – the inflation rate will be 11.5% during the current year, while next year it will stand at 9.2%. In the neighbouring countries like Croatia, the GDP will be higher by 3.8%, in Montenegro by 7.5%, in Macedonia and Bosnia and Herzegovina by 5.5%, while Albania will see a 6.1% growth.
RUBIN EXPORTS TO RUSSIA
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ubin from Kruševac announced that the company is preparing to sign a contract stipulating export of alcoholic drinks, with one contract having already been signed. The CEO of Invej, a business
reaching thus 38.9 billion euros. Disclosed in absolute amount, deposits have been increased by 10,2 billion and net loans by 10,6 billion euros. The number of branches increased to 868. Last year 178 new branches were opened at the level of the group, namely 46 branches in Greece and 132 in other countries. Total number of employees compared to September 2007 increased by 2431 i.e. by 20% and now Piraeus Group has 14 376 employees. Growth trend with regards to all relevant indicators at the level of Piraeus Group is expected to continue in the fourth quarter of 2008 and market conditions are expected to result in increase in loan volume, particularly outside Greece. Greek banking system is healthy and can use all potentials of the region when the market stabilizes.
system that incorporates Rubin, Stanko Tomović said that following a purchase of the latest machinery, the bottling process was now much faster. He said that the management is especially satisfied with a demand for the company’s brandy, with almost five million bottles sold last year.
CAR PARTS FACTORY IN SVILAJNAC
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eputy Prime Minister, Mlađan Dinkić, said at the ceremony apropos the beginning of construction of a new car parts factory REUM in Svilajnace that Serbia’s strategic priority, after signing the contract with FIAT, was to continue developing its car industry. REUM produces plastic components and automatic control systems for global leaders in car in-
SEVEN SERBIAN COMPANIES AT ICT FAIR IN DUBAI
every serious company, just like REUM, is welcome in Serbia”, said Dinkić and mentioned that REUM was going to invest €10 million in Serbia and hire close to 300 new workers, while the production would be export-orientated. The Municipality of Svilajnac consigned 5 hectares of land, with the complete infrastructure in the Veliko polje industrial zone, while their German partner is obligated to build a factory and start production by the end of March 2009.
AUSTRIANS INTERESTED IN FURTHER INVESTMENTS
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ith the help from Serbian Investment and Export Promotion Agency (SIEPA), seven companies from Serbia took part in the Information and Communication Technologies Fair in Dubai, which took place from October 19th to October 23rd, This is the first time that SIEPA has organized participation of Serbian companies at one of the biggest ICT fairs in the world entitled GITEX Technology Week. “The main goal is promoting the Serbian ICT sector as a good investment location and presenting domestic companies and their export potentials”, SIEPA says. Companies like Belit, Benet, Kernel, Bio IRC and Logo presented their businesses at Serbia’s national stand, stretching over 108 square metres. Also, ProZone Company, Europoint Systems and Serbian Software Cluster, which assembles software companies operational in Serbia, all took part in the Fair. In the words of SIEPA, the Dubai Fair is the second largest ICT Fair in the world, after CEBIT in Hanover. dustry like Mercedes, BMW, Porsche and Volkswagen. Dinkić also said that Serbia made close to a billion Euros this year from exporting car parts, not including car production, and added that the goal was for the export to be even higher and for more people to find employment in that industry. “Car parts pro-
duction employs a lot of workers. Through SIEPA (Serbian Investment and Export Promotion Agency), the Government of Serbia is going to grant €4,000 per each new worker that will be employed in this new factory. This is an incentive that is going to be granted to the car industry in general on the territory of Pomoravlje, and
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ustrian businessmen are interested in investing more in Serbia, particularly in the area of infrastructure, roads, railways, telecommunications and environmental protection. This was the conclusion of the meeting between Serbian and Austrian Chambers of Commerce that took place in Belgrade, on October 21st.
NEW FEATURES FOR VOLVO S80
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he Volvo S80 model year 2009 has the same overall length as its predecessor (4.850 mm), but is 27 mm broader and 34 mm taller. The wheelbase is longer and the track is wider. All this creates entirely different proportions, with added stance and dynamism in the car’s visual expression. The headlamps, which are positioned lower down than in the previous S80 model, follow the curvature of the front and have been extended along the side and up towards the bonnet, creating a gentle smile at the front. The doors are more convex and pronounced in shape. They now also include the rearmost side window. The shoulder line is both higher and broader than before, and the sills have a more pronounced profile, creating a visually lower centre of gravity and imparting a steadier, more stable appearance. The new rear spoiler is a discreet colour-coordinated accessory. It enhances the car’s sporty appearance and helps improve the car’s handling characteristics - especially at high speeds. The interior design is characterised by clean surfaces, harmonious lines, exciting contrasts and smooth function. Volvo S80 Executive model’s front seats, with perforated leather and a message function, have a new design that provides a modern look with an obvious touch of exclusivity. There are three upholstery levels to choose from. The optional cooler in the rear seat has a light that shines through the two glasses in a very characteristic manner. The
Rear Seat Entertainment System has been updated with new and enhanced screens (that are located on the rear side of each front seat head restraints) and have been further developed and provide improved better viewing in daylight conditions. The screens’ size has been increased to 8”. Volvo S80 can now be equipped with an additional high-tech function - digital TV, making it possible to watch land-based digital TV in the car. The system also makes it possible to watch pay-per-view television broadcasts, among other things. CorD / November 2008 39
THE NEW COMMERCIAL VEHICLE SALES & SERVICE CENTRE MERCEDES-BENZ IN BELGRADE
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n 24th October 2008, Mercedes-Benz Srbija i Crna Gora opened the new facility, which is just the latest in a long line of achievements that we have made since arriving on this market almost 12 years ago. Mercedes-Benz came to Serbia with the mission of introducing to this market the true values of product quality and outstanding customer services. Values, which are in line with customers expectations and valid for our entire product range. `Today we feel we have achieved this goal`, said Mr. Stavros Paraskevaides, CEO of Mercedes-Benz Srbija I Crna Gora, `because we are now able to introduce a complete range of commercial vehicle services to the highest international standards in one place`. The New Commercial Vehicle Sales & Service Centre is a concrete example of our ongoing expansion of Mercedes-Benz in Serbia and the wider region. It repre-
During the Austrian delegation’s visit, the President of the Austrian Chamber of Commerce, Christoff Leitl, said that Serbia was on a good path to rectifying the economic standstill of the past. Austrian businessmen are reviewing possibilities to invest in Serbia, considering stability, respect and trust as being exceptionally important for doing business, Leitl said and added that the Austrian economy would support the Serbian economy which had already been doing a lot to overcome the difficulties in the past. Austrian businessmen, who are already doing business in Serbia, complain about complicated administrative procedures, local authorities interfering too much and problems with utility services. They asked the Serbian Chamber of Commerce to assist them in resolving these problems in order for them to implement investments as soon as possible. President of the Serbian Chamber of Commerce (PKS) Miloš Bugarin promised to provide assistance to Austrian companies, saying that Austria is one of the most important business partners of Serbia and the leading investor. In the past eight years, Austria invested over $2 billion in the Serbian economy. During the first eight months of this year, the total foreign exchange between the two countries amounted to $718.4 million, with Serbian exports to Austria amounting to $318.5 million, and imports to $400.2 million – said the President of PKS adding that that this was a quite balanced exchange. Last year, the total foreign exchange between Serbia and Austria was $903 40 CorD / November 2008
sents an investment in infrastructure and people, and is an excellent facility for a good market with a great future. The Center is built over an area of 25,000 square-metres and conforms to the highest contemporary standards of MercedesBenz worldwide. With 50 new jobs – 20 of which are at the centre itself, it has also contributed in adding jobs in this area. Primary importance of this investment
million, with the deficit on the Serbian side amounting to around $300 million, Bugarin said.
NIŠ-EXPRESS BOUGHT BY COMPANY’S OWN EMPLOYEES
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he Privatisation Agency announced that a contract on sale of Niš-Express would be signed on October 17th with a consortium of the company’s employees. Workers in Niš-Express were the only ones to have submitted a bid at a repeated tender for sale of 57.5% of the company’s capital. The first tender for Niš-Express was invited at the beginning of 2006 and was subsequently declared void since none of the bids that were submitted were satisfactory, and none of the bidders provided an appropriate investment programme. The Niš transport company had a profit of RSD1.3 million last year, which was seven times less than in 2006. The company deals in passenger transport over short and long distance and interstate transport, as well as bus production.
is to be found in its ability to meet the needs of local and transit customers, positioned as it is alongside the most traversed highway in the country. The facility will operate seven-daysa-week and will focus on our commercial vehicle services, is a clear indication that Mercedes-Benz Srbija i Crna Gora believes in the further economic growth of Serbia and is determined to be a part of it.
VISIUM AIR WILL RECONSIDER ITS INVESTMENT
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irector General of Austrian company, Visium Air, Slađana Rajzinger said that this company planned to seriously re-examine the contracted investment in Zrenjanin. “At the time when Visium Air was deciding to invest, Zrenjanin was known as a town with best conditions for doing business in Serbia, and today, the image of this town has been seriously damaged by the town being associated with mafia and crime”, she said. Rajzinger adds that such turn of events will definitely affect business results of the existing and future companies in Zrenjanin. “The Mayor of Zrenjanin, Goran Knežević was a competent interlocutor and was a guarantor that investments made in Zrenjanin were safe. The situation that he found himself in is frustrating for everybody who decided to invest here bearing in mind the business conditions in Zrenjanin, which are, after all, created, largely thanks to the town’s mayor”, the Visium Air press release says. Visium Air will inform other investors of the company’s stance. The investment contract was signed at the end of August, and according to the company’s CEO and proprietor, Elvir Šehić, there were plans to build a
factory and pilot school there, not far from the Ečka Airport which would cost close to €30 billion.
MERGER BETWEEN SPINNAKER AND HERMES
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oftware companies Spinnaker and Hermes Softlab will merge, and a new company name will be revealed once it has been agreed upon within ComTrade Group, it was announced at the Synergy Fair in Novi Sad. The ComTrade Group took over Slovenia-based Hermes Softlab in May this year, while Spinnaker is already a member of ComTrade Group which is present in 14 countries and on three continents, it was said at the press conference. Jelena Antić from Spinnaker said that during these last six months, since the merger with Hermeslab, the two companies have already had a joint appearance on Serbian market, and added that talks were held over the implementation of an IT project for Slovenian health system and a project for a German telecommunications operator. Vladan Atanasijević from ComTrade said that Hermeslab became a member of ComTrade Group in May and that plans for the latter half of this year were still being made, while in 2009 the company would appear on the market as one. Several days after the merger between ComTrade and Slovenian Hermes, the owner of the biggest computer company in Serbia, Veselin Jevrosimović went to the US where he was acknowledged as an honorary citizen of Boston. Since he’s been developing software programmes in his US-based company, Spinnaker USA, for quite some time with his company’s clients including the likes of IBM, H&P and Ericsson, Jevrosimović has been a dear guest of the State of Massachusetts Senate on several occa-
FIVE IKEA SHOPPING MALLS IN SERBIA
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wedish furniture producer, IKEA is willing to invest between €875 million and €1 billion in constructing new production and retail spaces in Serbia and hiring 9,250 people, according to the President of the Board of Directors of IKEA, Mikael Olsson. IKEA has expressed interest in two locations in Belgrade, and one in each of the Serbian regional centres of Novi Sad, Niš and Čačak. IKEA has asked the Government of Serbia to secure 35 to 45 hectares of land per location, at no charge or at minimum cost. When it comes to Belgrade’s metropolitan area, IKEA is interested in locations near Zemun Polje, and close to the Bubanj Potok bypass. In addition to these two locations, IKEA is interested in a location on the road to Smederevo, due to its good transport infrastructure. The Government of Serbia also needs to provide commercial and building permits in the shortest possible amount of time, tax reliefs, the Swedish company being given the trusted importer title and harmonization of Serbian and Swedish laws and standards. sions, and was named an honorary citizen of Boston as a sign of appreciation for the cooperation in the IT field. “This time I was invited to come to the US officially. Following a recommendation by the President of the US BioTech Association, we chose the state of Massachusetts as the headquarters of our
company Spinnaker USA. This state has two great universities, Harvard and MIT, which are orientated towards modern technologies. BioTech is an organization which assembles the biggest global companies and scientists who are engaged in developing bio-technology for which the US government sets aside $5 billion a year”,
ATTRACTIVE INTEREST RATES FOR TIERING SAVINGS UP TO SIX MONTHS period of six months. Tiering savings up to 6 months offers a higher interest rate if the money has been invested for a longer period of time. Table for savings in EUR:
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he savings account with tiered interest rate combines fixedterm savings deposit earning interest at stimulative rates, while the client has the possibility to access the deposited funds at any moment. In addition to this, contrary to the standard deposit, the interest rate is not fixed but tiered, according to the predefined deposit term step. According to this model, payments can be made in euros and dinars. The minimal amount of a deposit in euros cannot be less than EUR 500, while for payments in dinars minimum amount required is RSD 20.000. There are seven tier levels included in the maximum deposit
Deposit term Interest rate
Month 1 2,00%
Month 2 3,00%
6 months Month 3 Month 4 4,00% 5,00%
Month 5 6,00%
Month 6 12,00%
*Overview of annual deposit terms and nominal interest rates. Effective interest rate: 5.27% – 5.33% p.a.
Minimum payment: 500 EUR Upon expiry of each deposit term, the stimulative interest rate moves upwards for each succeeding deposit and in the last interest calculation period may reach 12% from the initial 2% for euros, i.e. 18% from the initial 8% for dinars. Furthermore, upon the expiry of each deposit term the accumulated interest shall be added to the amount of the principal. CorD / November 2008 41
Audi Q5
SYMBOL OF NEW SUVS
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UVs have become a status symbol and an uprising trend among a new generation of drivers. Owners of these vehicles have an opportunity to confirm their status, lifestyle, and a flair for off-road driving, all at the same time. Drivers with an active and dynamic lifestyle in Serbia will have an opportunity to meet Audi Q5 in the second half of this November. - The main features of the new SUV Audi Q5 include a sports spirit, innovative technology, and progressive design, tailored to our everyday activities and life. Audi’s new SUV is no longer just a superior and powerful engine for difficult terrains and adrenaline-high adventures, it now reflects an active lifestyle and provides an ultimate experience – explained Slobodan Pešić, Audi Brand Director for Serbia. The Audi Q5 will be available in three models – three different engines, one pet-
Jevrosimović says and adds, “They were so enthusiastic about our software programme that they told the Massachusetts Senator I was some sort of great visionary in technological research.” Jevrosimović was a guest at a reception in the Boston Town Hall, where he was handed a plaque as the honorary citizen of Boston.
WHEAT PLANTED ON OVER 15% OF FIELDS
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he wheat sowing its nearing its end with 15% of the fields set aside for sowing already having been sown, the Director of the Wheat Fund Vukosav Saković said. This will be the most expensive sowing season so far, and the realistic plans are for 550,000 to 600,000 hectares of land being sown, Saković says and adds that last year close to 487,000 hectares were dedicated to wheat production. The drop in maize prices and the fact that cooking oil refineries still haven’t reimbursed the farmers for this year’s sunflower yield all contribute to such an extensive sowing of wheat. The optimal period for wheat to be sown is from October 5th to October 25th.
HIGHER STANDARDS IN PROVIDING PRIVATE SECURITY SERVICES IN SERBIA
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wedish company Securitas AB became a holder of the controlling stake in Belgrade company SCP International which specializes in providing security services. Securitas announces that it will 42 CorD / November 2008
rol and two Diesel. All engines have direct injection and turbo chargers, ena-
bling very stable and economical functioning, with a lot of strength.
introduce and apply higher business standards in SCP. “Quite soon, we are going to start introducing new work procedures and the comprehensive implementation of high business standards which our company is known for” the management of Securitas AB said and added that they plan to invest in new businesses in the area of private security in Serbia. According to Securitas’ Director for Europe, Burt Adams, the taking over of the Serbian SCP International was a part of an expansion strategy for Eastern Europe which is viewed by this multi-national company as very important. SCP International, which provides security services, fire protection, transportation of money and valuables and alarm monitoring, was founded in 2003 and is the third largest security company in Serbia. The company has 1,500 employees, and annual turnover of €8 million. Securitas AB, together with its branches, employs 250,000 people and is present in over 30 countries of the North and South America.
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MG REMEDY INVESTS IN ZRENJANIN
contract on construction of production facilities, worth €1.5 million, was signed by Belgrade-based company MG Remedy and City of Zrenjanin in Zrenjanin Town Hall in mid-October. The contract stipulates that MG Remedy will construct two facilities for production of low-calorie food, medicinal and cosmetic products on 3.5 hectares of land, and hire 80 to 140 people from Zrenjanin. The contract was supposed to be signed on the day when Mayor of Zrenjanin, Goran Knežević was apprehended by the police. The contract was signed by the CEO of MG Remedy, Dragana Šutić and Director of the City of Zrenjanin Building Directorate, Branislav Knežević.
EBRD GRANTS A €20-MILLION-LOAN TO SBB?
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he European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) announces that it will consider lending €20 million to the cable and Internet operator SBB to be spent on taking over companies in Serbia and the region. The EBRD website (www.ebrd.com), says that the loan will make it possible for the SBB to demonstrate the sustainability of a regional approach to company development, as well as to solidify its position on the market and serve as an example to other companies. SBB was one of the first companies to offer satellite TV services on a regional level, and a pioneer in the development of wireless Internet in Serbia. The company aims to manage the companies it is going to take over in the same way as SBB is being managed.
At the end of September, SBB announced that the company is going to install satellite TV in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia called Total TV, which is also underway in Montenegro, Slovenia and Serbia. The President of SBB’s Managing Board, Dragica Pilipović-Čefi, says that SBB plans to take over a regional company, but did not want to divulge any further details. SBB is owned by Adria Cable, a company registered in The Netherlands, according to the Business Registry Agency’s website (www.apr.gov.rs).
RATEL ANNOUNCES CHEAPER INTERNET
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he Managing Board of the Republic Telecommunications Agency (RATEL) has adopted three rule books whose application will facilitate stronger competition in the Internet market which, in turn, will lead to new services for end users, better quality and lower prices, RATEL recently announced. RATEL’s Managing Board will release the Rule Book on Providing VoIP Services and the Rule Book on Conditions for Issuing Licences for Public Telecommunication Networks in the Republic of Serbia Official
Gazette which will mark the beginning of their implementation. The third rule book, which is yet to be applied, is the Rule Book on Conditions and Procedures for Licensing a Public Telecommunications Operator for Connecting Domestic Telecommunication Network with Foreign Telecommunication Networks.
FALL WINTER 2008
NEW AUCTION FOR INEKS’ SKYSCRAPER
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he Privatisation Agency announced that a business building owned by Ineks Interexport in downtown Belgrade is going to be offered for sale on November 18th, at the initial price of RSD2.72 billion. This is the second attempt in trying to sell the building which is located in the Kraljica Marija Street, which is 21 storeys high and covers 12,900 square metres. This time around, the initial price was reduced by RSD480 million, the Agency says. Interested bidders have to purchase the sales documentation first at the price of RSD150,000 and pay a RSD1.28 billion deposit at least five working days before the auction takes place.
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he collection’s inspiration was a mixture of personality and style of extraordinary women like Katherine Hepburn, Greta Garbo and Marlene who started a history of strong, contemporary women. The impeccable, effortless style of these casual and confident urban woman inspired the silhouettes, shapes and styles of the collection. A tout around the world to completely different places stimulated the colors and fabrics. From Chicago to Berlin, from the Shetland to Switzerland, she travels the world. Mixing and matching colors, fabrics and yarns in an ultimate downtowns spirit, the collection allows her to live a more distinguished and casual lifesyle.
NEW TENDER FOR RTB
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he management of the Mining and Smelting Basin Bor (RTB Bor) and Privatisation Agency are going to change the restructuring programme for RTB Bor thus enabling invitation of a tender for selection of a strategic partner by the end of October, the State Secretary in charge of economy and privatization Nebojša Ćirić says. At the press conference apropos the first 100 days of the Ministry of Economy and Regional Development’s work, Ćirić said that, unlike the previous two tenders, this time around a contract about joint investment would be signed with the strategic partner, which will also have a majority stake, while the state’s stake would be comprised of RTB’s property. The state of Serbia will also retain a right to veto some of decisions, like declaring bankruptcy or relocating the company. In a pre-qualification part of the tender, 11 companies sent their letters of interest in investing in RTB. According to earlier information, the letters were sent by Swiss-based Glencore, Austrian A-Tec, Cyprus-based East Point and two Russian companies among others. CorD / November 2008 43
BOURGAS –ALEXANDROUPOLIS OIL PIPELINE STOPPED
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he beginning of construction of an oil pipeline stretching from Bulgarian Bourgas to Greek Alexandroupolis is moved to October 2009, while the pipeline will become operational in 2011. The initial plan was to start constructing the 285-kilometre-long-oil-pipeline at the end of this or the beginning of next year. The Bulgarian Minister for Regional Development and Construction, Asen Gagauzov says that the reason for this delay is not of a financial nature, i.e. due to the global financial crisis. The project is estimated to be worth close to a billion Euros, and the current crisis should not affect the extension of a loan of between €600 and €900 million, Gagauzov said. According to experts, it is quite possible that construction is going to be postponed due to shareholders of the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (KTK), which was envisaged as being the central oil vendor, inability to agree on whether to double the capacity. Another reason for the delay could be found in the fact that the US is exerting pressure on Greece and Bulgaria since the US is against the pipeline - that will transport Russian oil - being constructed at all. The Bourgas – Alexandroupolis oil pipeline will reduce the transport of oil via tankers passing through the Bosphorus and Dardanelles straits. In the first phase, the pipeline’s capacity will be 35 million tons a year, and later 50 million. The Russian side would have a 51% stake in the pipeline, that is equally distributed among Transneft, Rosneft and Gazprom Neft. The remaining 49% are in the hands of Bulgaria and Greece.
BLUE CARD FOR ‘MOVING IN’ WITH EUROPEAN UNION
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U representatives have reached an agreement about issuing the so-called blue card, similar to the US green card, by which the Union wants to attract highly qualified workers and experts from developing countries, the French Presidency over the EU has announced. The blue card, with a validity period of four years, will provide an opportunity for candidates to secure work permits, and for their families to join them, find an appropriate accommodation and permanent residence. By introducing the blue card, the EU is trying to gain an advantage over the US and other Western countries in attracting technology experts and medical staff from developing countries whose inhabitants are rapidly growing older. According 44 CorD / November 2008
The first red wine from Cellar Aleksandrović, Triumph Noir 2006
TRIUMPH NOIR – DOT ON I
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inot Noir or red burgundy, as it is known in our country, is capricious, elusive and, according to its temperament, slightly “feminine”, which mostly results in exactly such wines – sensual and seductive. It requires much, both in the vineyard and in the cellar, but can also offer the most among all red varieties. As such, Pinot Noir represents the biggest possible challenge for winemakers and wineries throughout the world. Pinot Noir is a cult wine of Burgundy, but also a part of our tradition, because until the Second World War on the slopes of Oplenac, in royal vineyards it was cultivated as a real royal variety. Continuing down the path of the ancestors of Oplenac winemakers and as a sign of respect towards the heritage of kings-winemakers, Petar and Aleksandar Karađorđević, of the “Podrum vina Aleksandrović” (Aleksandrovic’s Wine Cellar) have decided to start their “red line” with Pinot Noir. On the 22nd September, their cellar produced the first series of exclusive red wines “Aleksandar”: Triumph Noir 2006. Original Pinot Noir is an almost hypnotic wine, composed of concentric circles of aromas, circulating in our consciousness, persistently and caringly repeating the complex melody of aromas and scents. What kind of wine has been desired by the winemakers from Aleksandrovic Wine Cellar? “Intense. Inspiring. Intriguing. You can now judge for yourself how well we succeeded, and we hope that you will primarily recognise our sincere dedication to this species and this wine,” says vineyard owner Božidar Aleksandrović. Pinot can be recognised by its purple cloak, which glitters in the glass, for its unique aromas and silky taste texture. This makes it one of the most desired types of wine in the world. This is what classifies Triumph Noir 2006 as a contestant for the first major Serbian red wine. The colour of ripe black cherry, with a purple glow and nuances of onion leaves on the brim. Strong red fruit aromas melt away after a few moments into a steady, warming scent of jam, from which stand out aromatic notes of strawberries. Deep in the depths one can taste a hint of ticklish scents of baked bread crust and a box of good cigars.
to EU data, highly qualified foreign workers make 1.7% of the total number of foreign workers in the EU, while this percentage in Australia is 9.9%, in Canada 7.3% and US 3.2%.
Analysts say that the blue card system will not be enough to attract experts and compete with the US green card, since it
doesn’t allow the experts to have access to the whole labour market but only one EU member. After working for 18 months with a blue card in one EU country, a foreign worker will be allowed to move to another EU country, but will have to apply for a new blue card within a month and a half upon arriving. This rule was made further from countries which want to preserve control of their labour market, like Germany, insisting on it. The blue card will be issued to highly qualified workers which signed a contract stipulating annual gross salary 1.5 times higher than the average salary in an EU country. This limit can be reduced to 1.2 if there
is a great demand for a certain profession. The government of EU countries can refuse to issue a blue card due to problems in the labour market or in the case of exceeding the national quotas. EU ministers are due to adopt this new system in the following weeks, which will come into force within 30 months from the adoption – European officials say. This was a result of the requests made by new EU members, like the Czech Republic, which demanded for the limitations in access to the labour market to be lifted first for the workers from new EU members.
SURPLUS OF BREWERIES AND SUGAR REFINERY PLANTS
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he realignment of forces in beer industry has begun. The Pančevo brewery was the first ‘victim’, since their new owner, multi-national company Heineken, decided to keep only two breweries, the ones in Novi Sad and Jagodina. The same destiny will befall quite a few of our sugar refineries. It is no secret that only five sugar refineries will remain in Serbia in the following few years, out of the 10 that are currently operational. However, the issue here is why are new owners waiting when they already know that there isn’t enough sugar beet to go around and that the refineries are working at half capacity. This year, the total sugar production is going to be around 320,000 tons which is a quantity that four, let alone five sugar plants, can easily produce.
Before this year’s campaign, there was a lot of talk about Sunoko temporarily closing down some of its four sugar refineries – Vrbas, Kovačica, Pećinci and Bač. But the company refuted these claims although it is quite evident that they need only two refineries, bearing in mind their capacity and the current demand. Italian SFIR has already temporarily closed down the production in Nova Crnja, and now all sugar beet is processed in Senta. Out of 11 sugar refineries in Vojvodina, two are probably never going to be re-
SHARE FUND SELLS MERIMA’S SHARES
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he Share Fund sold 2.33% of shares in Henkel Merima from Kruševac for €3.1 million, which were owned by the Privatisation Registry. The buyer is one of Henkel’s companies registered in Vienna, which owns a 70% stake in Henkel Merima factory, the Privatization Agency announced. Merima was sold to German company Henkel via tender in August of 2002 for €14.4 million. The new owner agreed to invest €43.1 million in the next five years, while €100 million has been invested in the Kruševac factory so far. The Privatisation Registry owns 15% of all companies that are being privatised via a tender, and the money from the sale will be allocated to all adult citizens of Serbia who are eligible to get free shares. The Registry had shares of 93 Serbian companies, and it is expected for 70 of them to be sold via a tender. The Privatisation Registry started selling shares in May this year and so far close to €250-million-worth of shares have been sold. opened – the ones in Zrenjanin and Kovin. Sremska Mitrovica is also in a difficult situation, just like Nova Crnja, while refineries in Bač, Pećinci, Kovačica, Vrbas, Žabalj, Crvenka and Senta are constantly working, and nobody knows whether there is going to be enough work for all of them. Nobody in the sugar business can give a definite answer to when the refineries are going to close down, but everybody agrees that some factories should be. Although everybody is keeping silent, a reply lies with the European Union. The owners are waiting for the EU to provide money for closing down sugar factories. Following a reform in the sugar industry, the EU has been providing money for shutting down surplus factories to the tune of €700 per ton of sugar produced in these factories. So, if you were producing 50,000 tons of sugar a year, you would get €35 million to shut the refinery down. However, this money does not go straight to the refinery’s proprietor. They have to re-invest it in some other business or different production. Also, not all of the money arrives at once, but is reimbursed in installments. As the Director of Senta’s sugar refinery, Ljubiša Radenković says for the Dnevnik daily, it is still uncertain whether this programme will be applied once Serbia joins the EU, but our sugar industry is hopeful that they will get some EU money too. “The EU’s sugar industry reform is limited to three years, and the deadline is quickly approaching”, Radenković says, “however, there is a realistic chance of a special programme being adopted for the countries that are going to become EU members in the next few years.” He adds that this programme would be certainly useful if the money we got was used in launching another business or production and staying profitable. He also confirmed that the Serbian sugar industry is going through a severe crisis and its very survival is at stake. What could happen is that all domestic refineries are closed down.
There used to be 12 sugar refineries in Hungary, while now only one (in Kaposvar) is operational, albeit working only with a half capacity in order to process sugar beet from 8,000 hectares. Hungarians are now importing sugar from Germany, France and Serbia. If the sugar price in Europe and Serbia drops below €500 per ton, as expected, that would be another blow to the domestic sugar industry, since even with the price of €550 per ton from this year’s campaign, we are doomed, Radenković says.
PROPERTY OF MATROZ OFFERED AT A COMPETITION
T
he Serbian Privatisation Agency has released a competition for collection of bids for the paper factory Milan Stepanović Matroz which is bankrupt. As the Agency website says, facilities for production of cellulose and paper, buildings and relevant equipment, printing shop and founder’s rights in the mineral fertilizer producer, Matroz Korohumus are all being offered on sale. The value of the company’s property has been estimated at RSD1.64 billion. Public opening of bids is scheduled for November 13th in Belgrade. Prior to submitting a bid, interested bidders need to buy a sales documentation at the price of RSD250,000 and pay a deposit in the amount of RSD328.4 million by November 6th. Matroz declared bankruptcy in August last year, after three failed tenders. CorD / November 2008 45
MEDIA
Srđan Janićijević,Vice President of the FIC Board of Directors, General Director of Politika Newspapers and Magazines
Investments are Necessary “We have to resolve all political, lobbying, economic and all other factors preventing our citizen’s from accessing higher quality goods and services at lower prices.”
W
e spoke to Srđan Janićijević, FIC Vice President, about the economic policy of the state and future steps that the government could take to increase the number of foreign investments in Serbia. Other issues addressed by the General Director of Politika Newspapers and Magazines included socially responsible companies and ownership of media in Serbia. In your opinion, has the new government formulated a clear economic policy? Government policy is only roughly defined. It lacks a clear outline or clear presentation for the business world and citizenry, and thus there isn’t a wide consensus on what has to be done in the next three years. I would suggest creating a straightforward programme that every player in business and social life can easily learn by heart. That is the only solution if we all want to be on the same track. Of course, everyone is cautious about promising what they will or will not do, but the true leadership is summed in the following phrase: the leader announces what he is going to do; he does it; when finished, he reports on what has been done.
For example, it is perfectly clear that every show on TV Pink is signed off by Zeljko Mitrović. Those products are his. It is the same situation with Mr. Veran Matić or, for example, Mr. Raja Rodić According to the FIC, the sustainable economic development of Serbia will continue to be highly dependent on the influx of money from abroad in the upcoming period. This, the FIC says, requires the creation of a stimulating environment for Greenfield investments. In your opinion, what do we need to insist on in order to increase the number of foreign investments? At the first level, Greenfield investments in every branch of industry are an absolute necessity. Such investments should encourage competitiveness and increase competitiveness criteria on the local market. I believe the current government has a perfectly good understanding of this fact. The major business players in the world must be catered to in order to attract their business and investments. The second level is local and regional economy. It is crucial 46 CorD / November 2008
for Serbia to attract regional companies and establish partnerships with smaller Serbian companies, either through forms of joint investment or cooperation. The third, and perhaps most important, level of Serbia’s economic revival is rooted in start-ups and small enterprises. Every family in Serbia should produce something, as is the case with family businesses in Greece, Italy, Spain and so on. Such involvement enables employment stability, guaranteed minimum income and social involvement of every individual. This year’s White Book dealt with the Law on the Protection of Competition. According to the book, problems that still need to be dealt with include a lack of bylaws, a low threshold of total revenues and inconsistency in practice.
What is your opinion about this law? The Law is important, but it should be left to legal experts. In effect, we are still a highly closed market without sufficient levels of competitiveness. As long as the market is closed in such a way and lacks complete openness, every sort of monopoly or disloyal competition will be present. We have to resolve all political, lobbying, economic and all other factors preventing our citizen’s from accessing higher quality goods and services at lower prices. Here we still have the guiding principle that in a land of blind men, the one-eyed man is king! One section of this year’s White Book deals with the issue of corporate social responsibility, CSR. In your opinion, how high is the level of CSR awareness of companies in Serbia? I would emphasise two groups of companies. First are the foreign companies that are completely in tune with the concept
Media Role
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he media can help by attracting foreign investments and working with companies practicing corporate social responsibility, but they cannot help critically. The most beneficial model would be to praise good practice. If one business is recognised for doing something useful and good, others will follow. The populairty card should be used in the field of local economy. Such behaviour would produce the best results.
of CSR. Corporate social responsibility is embedded in their corporate practices and represents an every day way of conducting business. The other group are the local players who operated according to the old adage ‘monkey see, monkey do’. Not too long ago they discovered this social responsibility concept, and now, even though they weren’t paying their taxes, all of a sudden they are all involved in providing assistance in the fight for protection of the ozone layer. In short, we are facing an extremely long road to attaining socially responsible businesses. In your opinion, how important is a clear ownership structure of today’s media in Serbia? A clear ownership structure is crucial. None of the media players, except the public media service, should be governmentowned. The more difficult question is whether it’s sufficient to merely change the ownership structure in order to have independent media. We have an abundance of examples of privatelyowned media that are responsible for the deterioration of taste, while degrading their readers or viewers. At some point the state must be responsible for setting standards in a situation that sees the media scene completely left to market dynamics. The state must prevent the creation of kingdoms of lays, kitsch and distaste. It is also very important to identify the owners of media houses. In the media business, ownership can either add to the credibility of a product or diminish it. For example, it is perfectly clear that every show on TV Pink is signed off by Zeljko Mitrović. Those products are his. It is the same situation with Mr. Veran Matić or, for example, Mr. Raja Rodić. Every individual in the media business must be identified with the product they are creating. Then it is up to them to decide whether they will be known for ’stomach eliminator’ or ’the Bridge on the Drina’. Media cannot be allowed to exist only to satisfy small commercial or political interests. The role of the media is much bigger and substantially more important.
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Kneginje Zorke 11b. (+381 11) 308 99 77 Tel. (+381 11) 308 99 88 Fax. www.abcsrbija.com
FACES & PLACES
Statements to the media after the meeting of Serbian Army Chief of Staff, General Zdravko Ponoš, and U.S Navy Admiral. Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, noted that this was the first visit of such a high U.S. military official to Belgrade in 54 years
Australian Ambassador, H.E. Clara Birgin, welcomes Japanese Ambassador H.E. Tadashi Nagain to a reception in honour of the National Assambly of Serbia at Iguana on the Corner
“Women in Black” protest on Belgrade’s Republic Square on 15.October on the occasion of the international campaign of solidarity with the Non-Violent Movement in Iraq Award ceremony of schools new policy, Youth Initiative for Human Rights. Pictured: President of the Rockefeller Foundation, Richard G. Rockefeller 48 CorD / November 2008
H.E. Ambassador Wolram Maas welcomes H.E. and Mrs. Wordsworth to the celebration of the Day of Unification of Germany on 3rd October
President of the Parliamentary Committee for Foreign Affairs of Serbia, Dragoljub Mićunović, meets a delegation from the Australian Parliament
Japanese Ambassador H.E. Tadashi Nagai presented the ‘Robot in Japan’ stand at the Belgrade Book Fair
Head of the Military Academy of the Serbian Army, Major-General Vidosav Kovačević, and Bishop Athanasius of Hvosno signed the document on cooperation in the field of education, which was organising thematic lectures and discussions from various fields for students of the Military Academy and the Military High School
Prime Ministers of Serbia and Slovakia, Mirko Cvetkovic and Robert Fico, sign an agreement on the protection of military monuments in Belgrade
Annual Reception on the occasion of the Independence Day of Cyprus: Ambassador H.E. Homer Mavrommatis (centre) hosts guests including a group of children from the school in Pafos, who performed traditional Czpriot songs and dances dressed in national costumes CorD / November 2008 49
FACES & PLACES
H.E. Ambassador & Mrs. Igor Furdik and Defence Attache of the Slovak Republic, Colonel Frantisek Michalik, host a reception marking Slovakia’s Armed Forces Day at the Embassy of Slovakia in Belgrade
A reception at the Belgrade City Assembly on the occasion of the Day of the United Nations. pictured: Ethnic Albanian Leader in Serbia, Riza Halimi, Serbian Defence Minister, Dragan Šutanovac, and Ambassador Hans Ola Urstad, Head of the OSCE Mission to Serbia Russian Ambassador in Belgrade, H.E. Alexander Konuzin (centre) and writer Olga Slavnikova, pictured at the presentation of the Russian stand at the 53rd. Belgrade International Book Fair
50 CorD / November 2008
A reception at Belgrade’s Museum of African Art on the occasion of a formal visit of a South African business delegation to Serbia
Serbian President Boris Tadić attends the celebration of the 67th anniversary of the execution of students and teachers of the Great school class in Šumaricama, in a meeting with the citizens of Kragujevac
Jinter Etinger and Ruzica Djindjic, pictured after the signing of the Memorandum of Co-operation between Serbia and the German province of Baden-Wurttemberg
Newly appointed Ambassador of Austria to Serbia, H.E. Clemence Koja, officially opens the Austrian Institute at the Austrian Cultural Forum in Belgrade.
Ambassador of Japan in Belgrade, H.E. Tadashi Nagai, performs the flute as part of his farewell concert in Kolarac
Josep Ljoveras, Jean-François Teral and Hana Hubačkova - the delegation of the European “troika” - meet with the leadership of the Socialist Party of Serbia
Serbian President Boris Tadić (right) speaks with the President of the Austrian Chamber of Commerce, Christoph Leitl, during his visit to Belgrade CorD / November 2008 51
CORPORATE WOMAN
Diane Cromer, communications specialist in the business of Serbia and the U.S.
Communication is the responsibility BY: JELENA MICKIĆ You’ve had an interesting career and you’ve worked with various people on many projects. You work as a strategic communications workforce development specialist. What does that mean? Workforce development is about being able to strategically align your people in a way that is effective towards achieving your business goals. Also, you have to keep people happy. You need the best and the brightest who want to contribute their best to you. This has to do with your ability to communicate. A company should be able to communicate with a whole set of internal audiences and frankly if it looks at all the people who have something at stake and they communicate with them and are part of the internal circle then you have influenced more people than you can in an entire press conference. Press conferences are important, however, strategic communication is about creating dialogues. When I started playing around with this in the early 80s I realized that people were not strategically looking at people who had a stake in what they do and then segmenting them and talking to them in a way that made them feel their stake. You can’t separate communications from the need to communicate to all the people who influence the outcome of your business goals.
Diane Cromer is a strategic communications specialist and organizational development consultant with more than 25 years of experience in the US and 12 years experience in Central and Eastern Europe, particularly in Serbia. Ms Cromer shared with us her thoughts on the importance of public and strategic communication in Serbia today and in business in general. Ms. Cromer successfully runs a consultancy business both in the US and Belgrade 52 CorD / November 2008
Do you have set criteria you apply to choosing projects on which you are going to work? I want something that interests me, something I can do well and something my contribution will make a difference with, something that matters. I have done issue advocacy on children’s environmental health, stem cell research, I do communications development for political campaigns. Because of the work I’ve done in Serbia, I have had the opportunity to work in Palestine and with the reform politicians in Zimbabwe, in Indonesia, and have worked with women in Hong Kong, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines. This is the political work I like because you’ve got people who
are trying to make real change. They are reforming what was to what can be, so to be any part of that is to contribute and to make a difference, to make something better. You mentioned that you worked with many politicians, what is the main obstacle to working with people in power? I think the main obstacle is to be able to build trust in the relationship so we can take what I know and what you know and make it right for the circumstance. I like to work with people who are already successful and I’m just adding to that because that way you know you are involved in something that will result in success. One of the mistakes international consultants can make is to think that the American message is immediately transferable. In many measures the concepts are, but they need to be shaped to this context. Communication is the responsibility of the person speaking and not the audience. Politics creates a certain time when people get pushy with one another and politicians have to be very strong to accomplish the things they want. So, politicians and consultants have to be strong, and from time to time putting strong people in a room, things will become chaotic and everybody fights their fight, but it is important that everyone also respects each other and listens to one another. After everyone gets their opinion heard, then we come up with an idea collectively that is better than any of us had on our own. Consultants facilitate this process and are emotionally removed because everybody comes to the table with a personal agenda that needs to be satisfied and we facilitate the win/win. What is your opinion of public politicians’ communication skills in Serbia? There are few keys of being a successful communicator and there are a few keys to what politicians should do. One key is understanding your audience and your audience believes that you are speaking with them, that you respect them and their intelligence. So it is important that people talk to citizens with respect. The second important thing is to ensure that the audience can give you feedback. The problem of communication by press is that it is a
monologue with no feedback. Our politicians back home have constituent services. Every letter that is mailed to them gets answered. So, constituency services are quite important and are as important to citizens as budget preparation. Talking to the citizens is equally important. Politicians need to find a way to expedite this feedback mechanism then life between politicians and citizens becomes easier.
haven’t seen anyone able to create a clear vision where the majority of people in Serbia could join in. Serbians are cynical and skeptical and you can’t just use slogans. Vision is about who we can become, what we can achieve, what we want. All the work should be directed towards this vision. If you look at the great leaders of history the thing they had in common is that there was a mission that their people could engage.
Politics creates a certain time when people get pushy with one another and politicians have to be very strong to accomplish the things they want. So, politicians and consultants have to be strong, and from time to time putting strong people in a room, things will become chaotic and everybody fights their fight, but it is important that everyone also respects each other and listens to one another Why is Serbia struggling with a negative image on the political stage? What can be done? We all struggle with this because there are actions that have been done in the name of Serbian people that have made them look monstrous. Many parties are responsible for the failures of the 1990s. Communicating hope is important for politicians. I
IMAGE
OPPORTUNITY
CAPITALISM
Serbians needn’t worry about what people think. Anyone who knows Serbia knows the true story. If Serbia focuses on being the best people it will begin to change, but There is a needs to be a branding of Serbia.
There is unlimited opportunity.Those between the ages of 25-45 who have any ambition, confidence, and want to learn there is unlimited opportunity. Companies are screaming for employees.
Capitalism allows for innovation, creativity, opportunity, wealth, building up a middleclass. But it isn’t about taking and chewing up resources and using it for yourself and a handful of people.
Also, the transition was not treated by the stakeholders as a change management process. The theory of change management is about helping people changing ideas and behavior so when companies or countries treat this kind of transformation, complete and radical, there are steps that need to be followed to do this. First create vision, then urgency then create change champions and later, short term wins. No one has said we have accomplished this and look what we can do next. If we can do this we can do so much more. If we look at change and employ some principals everyone will become better at communications. Finally, Serbians needn’t worry about what people think. Anyone who knows Serbia knows the true story. If Serbia focuses on being the best people it will begin to change. After Kosovo we were again in a situation where people saw two minutes of hoodlums reeking havoc in the streets of Belgrade when CorD / November 2008 53
CORPORATE WOMAN
the other 9 million people in Serbia were doing soul searching on who they are. The world didn’t get to see that and it distressed me because I know what a great place this is. There needs to be a branding of Serbia and a vision. It needs to be unified and collectively communicated. You can’t brand to the outside world until you’ve done it in the inside world. There needs to be unification behind it. One of the things I saw in 2001 and 2002 in focus groups was that politicians need to fulfill a promise of a transparent government. So everybody said everything. There could be 38 press conferences in one day but there was no unity. Example: When we were warning about potential black outs in the aftermath of NATO bombing, that came out on one day. On the same day someone from Nis talked about the unlimited potential of geo-thermal energy in Serbia. Because it happened on the same day, reporters collapsed it and it was a contradiction. People thought that politicians were lying. You do trainings in companies. What kind of skills do employees need to adapt to changes and what are the expectations of employers during this integration to the EU? The whole concept of change management is about helping people to establish a new set of behaviors, accept a new set of ideas and to engage them to accept more responsibility and gain confidence to move forward. Americans have come to terms that employment is not a guarantee. We know that if we develop the skills that we can make ourselves employable, and that we should prepare for multiple career changes. Training is one part of the process and we need to understand that we are in a process. Managers should focus on their workforce and invest in the workforce in a strategic way. The title of our book is “Strategic Human Relations Management”, it’s about integrating HR as an executive partner. The second element is aligning people to your needs. The third is having a vision in a corporate culture so people will want to be with you. Some companies have 30% turnover. This is very expensive. You need to create a situation where people want to come and stay. The fourth is to get your employees to want to achieve quality. That’s the role of employers. No one suggests that the American model is the only appropriate one. It’s not family friendly because of how we drive employees. But there is an appropriate model that is fulfilling. In all focus groups that I attended with men between the ages of 25-45 the one thing they said they wanted most was to get a good job, to get promoted and to be treated fairly based on the quality of their work. There is unlimited opportunity. Those between the ages of 2554 CorD / November 2008
45 who have any ambition, confidence, and want to learn there is unlimited opportunity. Companies are screaming for employees. A comprehensive public policy is needed to prepare citizens for the new rules. If you had to list three main qualities of good measure what would you choose?
The ability to communicate, to think strategically and to engage others in achieving the goal. Managers are good at achieving tasks and they know what tasks they have to do. In the long term everything is more productive if you can communicate well, think strategically and see the big picture. If you can see the big picture you can prioritize well. You may be busy doing 10 tasks but strategic thinking is the key
to time management. Maybe only three of them were necessary. If you are not thinking strategically you are managing the next crisis instead of avoiding the crisis. What do you do with your free time in Belgrade? I have very little free time. Building a business and working tirelessly for little or no pay takes a lot of time. I have many good friends, so I enjoy what most Belgraders enjoy. That is having smart conversations, going to the Opera, Concerts, walking through the city. The fresco museum is my favorite place. I love the restaurants. I do a lot of traveling. Novi Sad, Nis, Uzice which is similar to an area in my home state of Pennsylvania. I love Zlatibor and Kopaonik. One of the ministers invited me and another consultant to spend the weekend in the mountains with him and his family. I’ve been lucky to be invited into people’s homes and lives. I’ve come to the point now that I am established enough to have the same human support system as I have in Washington. In life you only get a handful of friends, and I am lucky because I have my fair share at home and here. What is your next project? This business is my project. This may be a cultural difference, but business can be good or bad. They can contribute or take. In order to be a good business you have to make a profit. Making a profit means you pay taxes and employ people, and doing something that you care about you are contributing back. And we like to think that we are helping employees and employers become more successful. Another contribution is the way we have our employees and interns work because we are using all the tools we teach, motivation etc. Helping people make the next step. We started an internship program here, and people work with us for a few months and then they get a great job somewhere else. In the US the rule is that a very small percent of business last more than 5 years. I’m proud that my business in the US has lasted 22 years. This business here in Belgrade is only a little over a year old, we have another three or four years of hard work. These interns help us and it is gratifying to know that after they work a few months with us they are more employable and that is a contribution. We want to be a leader along with other companies in demonstrating social responsibility in business. Capitalism allows for innovation, creativity, opportunity, wealth, building up a middleclass. But it isn’t about taking and chewing up resources and using it for yourself and a handful of people. It can be about making your community stronger. That’s what we want to become.
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CULTURE
Belgrade Book Fair
Book City
BY JELENA JOVANOVIĆ
N
obel Prize winning author Ivo Andrić opened the Book Fair in 1970, setting a precedent that remains to this day whereby the Book Fair is formally opened by respected domestic writers. Today the Belgrade Book Fair is the biggest international book fair in the region: during the week-long event an average of 200,000 people visit the book fair. This year’s Book Fair was formally opened on 20th October by writer and Member of the Academy, Dragoslav Mihailović, while writer Nazuki Ikezawa spoke on behalf of the guest of honour - Japan. “The Belgrade Book Fair gathers together people who are interested in books even in such hard times; people who hail from contrasting cultural and linguistic fields but are connected by books. Not even the economic crisis, which has engulfed the whole world in recent months, succeeded in shaking the value of the book. It remains a marker: the reader opens it in trouble, searching for the voice that would lead him. We can place our absolute trust in books, and I hope that this Book Fair will also be a sing of things to come tomorrow,” said Ikezawa, speaking during the opening address. Mihailović, meanwhile, recalled one of his favourite nicknames he earned in his youth – The constant book-dragger. “I have brought a whole train of books here for you and I want to offer them to 56 CorD / November 2008
youyou’re your friendly acquaintance. I assured myself a long time ago that books warm one’s soul because one year, instead of buying a thermal-accumulation heater, my wife and I bought full bags of books and accepted a semi-cold apartment.” Mihailović expressed his wish that attendees receive the best earned nickname of ‘book-dragger’ after this fair, which would mean the same in both Japanese and Serbia – the one with a warm soul. Besides Japan, which handed over the title of guest of honour of the Belgrade Book Fair to Greece at the end of the fair,
The annual Belgrade Book Fair has a long and auspicious tradition.The first postwar Book Fair of the former Socialist Yugoslavia was held in Zagreb back in 1956. A year later, following completion of the construction of the Belgrade Fair Ground (a complex of several vast halls located alongside the River Sava) the Book Fair was moved to Belgrade.The inaugural book fair lasted six days and included 60 domestic and 36 foreign publishers. - “Nepomični zivot” (Immovable Life – published by Geopoetika) and “Tio sa Pacifika” (Tio from the Pacific – published by Rad). Both books were awarded significant literary prizes in Japan (Akutagawa Prize and Sogakulan Prize for youth literature) and had special promotions at the stands of Geopoetika and Rad at this year’s Belgrade Book Fair. Ikezawa held a lecture about Japanese literature for students of the Belgrade Faculty of Philology on 21st October. This year’s book fair also included the presentation of a creation of another very popular contemporary Japanese writer Haruki Murakami. The lecture covering Murakami’s work was held by Professor Vladislava Gordić-Petković. Hall 14 hosted photography exhibitions entitled “Kyoto” and “Modern Japanese Architecture”, and on the Japanese stand, in Hall 1, visitors could enoy the exhibition “Japanese garden”, authored by Aleksandar Dimitrijević.
Samizdat B92 presented, amongst other publications, an interesting title of British author Misha Glenny, entitled “McMob – Criminal with no borders”, and dealing with global organised crime publishers from Canada, the U.S., China, Iran, Russia, Italy, Great Britain, France, Germany, Poland, Switzerland, Spain, Portugal, Austria, Israel, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Montenegro, Macedonia, Brazil and Angola participated this year and, for the first time, publishers from Denmark and Ukraine also displayed works. The total number of publishers, both domestic and foreign, was over 800. The star of the Japanese presentation was Ikezawa, a popular contemporary Japanese author whose works have been translated into many world languages. Two of his books have been published in Serbian
The book “The John Coltrane Reference”, authored by Jasuhiro Fudjioka, was also presented, while those interested in diving into the successful business philosophy of the Far East could indulge their curiosity at the promotion of the book “Kaizen – Japanese management philosophy”. The Japanese Embassy’s Sirada Terohiko said that the status of guest of honour at the Belgrade Book Fair provided a unique opportunity for his country to show its books and publishing industry, but also the whole of Japanese culture, both traditional and modern. According to Terohiko, the Book Fair’s presentation of
Japan in Serbia is an opportunity for the two countries to become closer. According to Gojko Bozovic, a member of the Book Fair Council, besides the Japanese, among the most ambitious stands this year were the Polish, American, Russian and Canadian stands, as well as the EUNIC network stand, which gathered together the foreign cultural centres of EU countries in Belgrade (French Cultural Centre, British Council, Italian Culture Institute, Goethe Institute, Institute Cervantes and the Austrian Culture Forum). This year EUNIC presented itself with a joint programme on the topic “The art of living in EU countries”. Domestic publishers also awaited the Belgrade Book Fair impatiently this year, using the event to present the most important titles from the whole annual production. Laguna, the biggest publisher of fiction in Serbian, has published as many as 200 new titles since last year’s fair. It’s stand included the presentations of its new gems – Amin Maluf’s novel “Taniosova stena” (Tanios’ Rock), the historic novel of Philippe Gregory “Kraljičina luda” (Queen’s Fool), the new novel of Indian authoress Indu Sundarsen, entitled “Lepota nepoznatog” (Beauty of Unknown). Another new bestseller, “Sofi Kinsel” was also presented, as was the translation of Larousse’s acclaimed work “Big riddles of mankind”. Publishing house Stubovi kulture presented new novels of established and important Serbian authors David Albahari and Radoslav Petković, as well as a new edition of the poetry of Miroslav Antić a an important Serbian poet from the second half of the 20th century. The Serbian translation of the novel “Man in the dark”, the latest work of Paul Oster, was presented during the Book Fair by Geopoetika, a Belgrade publishing house which also promoted its translation of the new novel of Julian Barnes “This isn’t anything terrible”. Samizdat B92 presented, amongst other publications, an interesting title of British author Misha Glenny, entitled “McMob –
Dositej Obradović Award
F
rench publishing house Gaia Editions, from Bordeaux, was this year’s winner of the Dositej Obradović Award, which is presented at the Belgrade Book Fair each year to a foreign publisher for publishing the works of Serbian authors and thus contributing to the internationalisation of Serbian culture. Serbian Culture Minister, Nebojša Bradić, presented the award to Gaia Editions Manager, Suzannne Jull, on 22nd October. Gaia Editions has organised translations into French for many important Serbian authors, including Svetislav Basara, Velimir Ćurguz Kazimir, Erik Koš, Mirjana Novaković, Mihajlo Pantić, Miroslav Popović, Milivoje Srebro and Dragan Velikić. Last year it also published the Anthology of Serbian Short Stories. Criminal with no borders”, and dealing with global organised crime. Publishing house Archipelago, meanwhile, presented its collection “Pastry makers’ stories” which includes 18 stories of famous modern Serbian writers - Svetislav Basara, Mihajlo Pantić, Ljubica Arsić, Jelena Lengold, Milan Đorđević, Nenad Jovanović, Đorđe Jakov, Uglješa Šajtinac, Borivoje Adašević, Branko Anđić, Velimir Ćurgus Kazimir, Saša Ilić, Vasa Pavković, Vuk Ras, Srđan V. Tešin, Divna Vuksanović, David Albahari and Vladan Mijatović Živojnov.
The crowd of book-lovers packed into the 20,000m2 of several Belgrade Fair halls were presented with many new books and were offered discounts on all editions. There was great interest among visitors and the media, who gave in-depth coverage to all of the numerous and variegated happenings of the biggest annual book festival in Belgrade. With the dust yet to settle on the books presented at this year’s event, preparations for next year’s Belgrade Book Fair, which will feature Greece as the Guest of Honour, are already underway.
CorD / November 2008 57
SOCIETY
Serbia’s premiere website dedicated to the expatriate community
Expat.rs Serbia’s premiere website dedicated to the expatriate community has been extensively overhauled and is back better than ever with a new domain. What was once expat. org.yu has been transformed into the all new expat.rs and along with the new name there is a series of new and modernized features aimed at keeping expats informed and up to date on all the issues important to foreigners in Serbia.
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erbia, just like many other countries with a large expat population, has its very own portal which serves to provide expats with an intuitive community platform that provides useful and trusted information and with all of its new updates expat.rs hopes to continue with that objective. Connect and share ideas with other expats through the FORUM The expat.rs FORUM is a classic internet forum aimed at connecting expats and facilitating the exchange of information. Users can post questions on any topic and get answers from other expats who have dealt with the same issues. The FORUM can also be used to organize get-togethers, search for an apartment, meet new friends or even sell an old car. Learn about various EVENTS going on in Serbia Get all the details on upcoming events in the area from the EVENTS section on expat.rs. The EVENTS section features several listings for local events including concerts, art exhibitions, film screenings, ballet performances, fairs and sporting events. Users
58 CorD / November 2008
also have the option of submitting their own entries to the website to give other expats a heads-up on interesting events taking place in the area. From accountants to veterinarians, you’ll find them in the BUSINESS DIRECTORY The BUSINESS DIRECTORY is an open directory of local businesses which is organized into several different categories. Users can do a keyword search or browse through
The EVENTS section features several listings for local events including concerts, art exhibitions, film screenings, ballet performances, fairs and sporting events the specific categories and find the right business with just a few clicks of the mouse. Additionally, businesses may add their listing to the directory at no charge and gain access to a whole new group of customers. Users also have the option of leaving feed-
back, positive or negative, about businesses in the directory which helps other expats in deciding where their money will be spent. Find JOB LISTINGS for expats Job postings on poslovi.infostud.com are carefully sorted through and selected based on their descriptions which indicate the company is searching for an employee with an expat-type profile to fill the position. Specifically, those jobs which place a large emphasis on ability to speak a foreign language and/or are written in English or another foreign language. The jobs are organized into an easy to use list and descriptions are displayed in a window below when the job title is clicked upon. Expat.rs is by far the best place on internet for international speak-
ing candidates to find their next job. Get the basics on living in Serbia from the ARTICLES on expat.rs The articles on expat.rs cover several entertaining and informative topics and could definitely prove useful to an expat during their stay in Belgrade. They are written by experts in specific fields and are intended to help the expat get acquainted with their new host country. Topics range from shopping and nightlife all the way to an expat’s legal status in Serbia. Some articles are even written by expats themselves who, after living in Serbia for an extended period of time, have acquired specific knowledge or expertise on a certain topic. What’s next? Although the new website has just been completed, the expat.rs team is already hard at work on several plans for the future. They are currently on the hunt for a central location in Belgrade which will be home to the Expat Center. The Expat Center will provide information and support to expats in Belgrade offering also maps, souvenirs and possibly a concierge service.
INTERVIEW
July 2008 125
INTERVIEW
Dušan Petričić, Illustrator and Cartoonist
A World on a Sheet of Paper
Dušan Petričić, the wandering artist returns to Belgrade BY ŽARKA RADOJA
W
hat’s the use of books with no pictures in them? - asked Alice a moment before she went to Wonderland. The question is more than reasonable. Isn‘t every dream like a picture book? What kind of pictures? Not ordinary ones, which merely represent the world as it is, but special ones that make us think. That is what Dusan Petricic is working on. As late director Vicko Raspor said: ‘These are not jokes; this is philosophy, morality, and a view of the world.’ These are the words 60 CorD / November 2008
with which film critic Ranko Munitic explained the work of illustrator and cartoonist Dusan Petricic. Dusan Petricic was an inherent part of growing up in Yugoslavia in the 70’s and 80’s. The man whose illustrations adorned children’s books and TV shows was at the same time applying his writing skills to dissecting the daily political events in the former SFRY in Vecernje Novosti. However, with his departure, first to Rome in 1991 and then Canada in 1993 where he’s been living to this day, his masterpieces seem to have disappeared as well. As his
When you emigrate, when you leave for a completely different environment, the first things you have to cope with are the simple things in life; trying to respond to all the demands of that environment, which are sometimes complicated – it’s all very painful.The fact that I make cartoons helped me a great deal. I started looking within myself for what was troubling me and then I’d get it out of me and onto a paper. I always say that when something is troubling you, when you hit a wall, a big problem, the simple solution is to run away from it and make the agony lasts longer. The other way is to find out what’s bothering you. I always reached that answer by drawing and it made me feel a lot better.The problem goes away much faster colleague Rastko Ciric explained, it is hard to find his books; new editions aren’t being printed, and the owners are jealously holding on to old editions, so there are none in antique shops. Dusan Petricic was in Belgrade in October for a special reason. An exhibition called ‘Autobiographic,’ which covers 30 years of work by this author, has been opened at the Museum of Applied Arts. While enjoying the warm October days in Belgrade in one of its rare remaining old taverns, Dusan Petricic speaks of his life in Canada for CorD, the illustrating
scene in Serbia, the cities he’s drawn and of Belgrade then and now. The exhibition ‘Autobiographic’ represents your entire work in the past three decades. How long did it take you to collect it all? I’ve been preparing the exhibition since spring. It didn’t take me long for the Canadian part of the story, but I had some trouble searching for the works done in Serbia. That Belgrade part was pretty scattered; it had been like that for years. It was fortunate that the Museum of Applied Arts bought some of it; I managed to find some pieces in archives, but unfortunately not everything. I don’t know where some of my works are. One part of the exhibition is dedicated to the cities you’ve been to. How and when did you start doing illustrations of cities? Since I spent a part of my life – the past 15 or 16 years – out of the country, that made me dedicate a part of my work to my travels, to understanding the places I stayed in or passed through. These became
Petričić’s impression of Zurich you have here at this exhibition. What was it like to go to Canada? How much did your line of work help you in adapting? After Rome, I went to Toronto. My brother, an architect, lives there and so it was the logical choice as a place to live in. I live in Canada as a foreigner who learned
“I live in Canada as a foreigner who learned in 15 years what it means to be Canadian and live in a city like that. Observing from the sidelines has become a part of my life in that city, watching people, their environment, the mentality…” very interesting motifs for me. It all started a long time ago, back in 1976, when, as a cartoonist for Vecernje Novosti, I created a series of travel cartoons after staying in the US. I tried showing in my own way what I saw, that is, how I personally experienced America and what I found unusual in that vast and distant country. I went to America, among other things, to create an album of my impressions about the new continent, which was incredible to me back in the seventies. I felt like I’d gone to Mars. I spent five weeks in the US and Canada, photographed, drew, recorded interesting details. That’s how my interest in different environments started. Afterwards, the chaos in Yugoslavia began and I decided to go to Rome, where I lived for a year and a half. It was the most difficult period in my life precisely because of everything that was happening in Serbia; my head was a pretty chaotic place. However, I managed to commit myself to my work. That’s when I drew my impression of Rome – I imagined the whole city as one big fountain. After that I worked on a calendar for a company from Switzerland. Each page had a city on it. I drew various cities of the world, those that I had been to and those I hadn’t been to but had a certain feel for. All my emotions had to fit on a single piece of paper. That’s what
in 15 years what it means to be Canadian and live in a city like that. Observing from the sidelines has become a part of my life in that city, watching people, their environment, the mentality… I channeled my views of the world around me into the cartoons that I made in Canada. Regardless of my living there for 15 years, the provocation remains – I’m still explaining
to myself what Toronto is, what Canada is, and how people here live. I dedicate my last exhibition to that city in particular. Most recently I’ve been focusing on my own views of the country, and it’s interesting for me to discover some details about the city which even the people who have always lived in Toronto haven’t noticed, because they don’t view the city through the same eyes as a foreigner. ‘Dusan’s World’, the thing I’m working on at the moment, is mostly about Toronto and its architectural curiosities. That city doesn’t have architecture as captivating as that of Europe, but it does have modern architecture, very organized and well thought out. On the other hand, my drawings will have my perceptions of people as well, and of their psychology. Toronto has one special element now – it matured as the city of immigrants in the past decades. It’s interesting when you’re living in a city and you see it change thanks to the arrival of people from all over the world, who change it with their own cultural heritage. Over 55
Patričić’s take on the French capital CorD / November 2008 61
INTERVIEW
larly hard for you? In the beginning I was troubled by the difference in people and their different cultural heritages, while on the other hand there were emotions and memories of the life that I’d left behind. It’s difficult to come to terms with all of that, especially when you leave later in your life, like I did. In general, the rules of the game, rules of communication, people’s mentality and cultural heritage… everything, literally everything is different from the way it is here. It was tough to get used to it and even tougher to discipline myself in the given circumstances to work with full intensity, as I had done up until that moment. Fortunately, I had long since realized that it is far easier for me to accept from the start the responsibility and the blame for what was happening to me. I simply cope with problems more easily that way.
Petričić mingles at the opening of his latest exhibition in Belgrade percent of the population now belongs to one minority or another in Toronto today. Their influence is still largely to be felt in the city, but in five to ten years it will begin to be felt in a positive way. That is very interesting to watch and follow. How did you try to explain Canada and Toronto to yourself during the first years? When you emigrate, when you leave for a completely different environment, the first things you have to cope with are the
simple things in life; trying to respond to all the demands of that environment, which are sometimes complicated – it’s all very pain-
“When I used to work for Vecernje Novosti, we had more employed cartoonists than any other newspaper. Predrag Koraksic Koraks was there, Ranko Guzina,Toso Borkovic… New names kept appearing there all the time. However, the last ‘new’ name to come out was Tosa Borkovic.” ful. The fact that I make cartoons helped me a great deal. I started looking within myself for what was troubling me and then I’d get it out of me and onto a paper. I always say that when something is troubling you, when you hit a wall, a big problem, the simple solution is to run away from it and make the agony lasts longer. The other way is to find out what’s bothering you. I always reached that answer by drawing and it made me feel a lot better. The problem goes away much faster.
Petričić has illustrated numerous book covers 62 CorD / November 2008
Which city was the most intriguing to you? I lived in Rome, I was in Paris several times for short periods, same for London. I loved London, in spite of the political climate of the time. Why? I can’t explain it. Paris, Zurich, and don’t even get me started on Moscow, are all interesting to me. For me as an artist who deals with cities as part of his work, any final decision about the most intriguing or the “best” is always going to be disputable. They all have their characteristics and they all provoked me in one way or the other, which I later turned
What was particu-
into a drawing. You often return to Belgrade. The city, like all the cities from the former Yugoslavia, has experienced many urban and demographical changes. What was the Belgrade you left like and what is it like each time you come back? I see it on two levels now: an emotional one and a rational one. I’m older so I can control the emotional part; I manage to rationalize things and set them on a normal level. We know what happened in Belgrade; it wasn’t damaged in internal conflicts; it initiated damage in neighbouring countries, but it also experienced a bombardment which was a serious worldclass crime at the end of the 20th century. It had to change and it’s still changing. What is most visible is a change in mentality and I notice this in part by watching people and in part by spending time with
my old friends. In that sense, Belgrade has changed a lot, and the most obvious is the change in education. Whether the city has started to glow, whether new buildings have been constructed, these are all lovely, positive changes, but they’re not the part that interests me the most in this city. I’m disturbed by the changes in young people who grew up in complete chaos. Their education, from primary to university education, has degraded. I see it, read it, hear it. Education must prepare these people for a future of some kind, and if you start off with a poor education, the prospects aren’t that great. Changes are also visible in the people’s mentality, when you see them coping with some external problems. More educated people would know how to solve these problems; many people here do not. You have young people who have a completely blurred perspective as to what the basic cultural values are. However, I know where I’m going and what suits me when I come here, I don’t touch the things I don’t like. I come here to recharge my batteries and then go back to Canada. I believe that’s the general immigrant story. Do you follow the illustrating Serbian scene? What does it look like? There are few illustrators and cartoonists showing up in the media but that number seems to dwindle each year. Not much. I see the main things on the internet, but that’s pretty scarce. Caricature in the past twenty years has been represented almost solely by Koraksic. No new name has appeared. The illustrations I do see are ok at best, but nothing more than that. It could be a lot better. It is partly a consequence of all the events in the past two decades, but also a consequence of the events in printed media and the appearance of electronic media. It is a fact that printed media and magazines are becoming less and less popular, so there’s less and less room for a political cartoonist. When I used to do cartoons in Yugoslavia, Vecernje Novosti, which I worked for, had more employed cartoonists than any other newspaper. Predrag Koraksic Koraks was there, Ranko Guzina, Toso Borkovic… New names kept appearing there all the time. However, the last ‘new’ name to come out was Tosa Borkovic. After him there was no one! As for the illustrations, I believe the books will survive, but they’re not in a great position either and that’s one of the reasons why there are no young artists in that area. The situation in Serbia isn’t all that different from the situation in the rest of the world. If you go round bookstores, you’ll find a fairly large number of illustrated children’s books, but that’s not the same as saying that the industry is thriving.
Petričić’s illustration of Cary Fagan’s ‘My New Shirt’ Are you planning a return from Canada? Yes and we will probably come back at some point. Not because it’s better here, but because we’re approaching an age where we’re not filled with energy anymore, and being that I left relatively late in my life, I re-
mained very much attached to Belgrade, or to be more precise, to Zemun. I think that a change of living space is very important for each person; I’m happy with the way I live and work in Canada, but there will come a time, and it’s getting ever closer, when we will indeed wish to come back.
Dušan Petričić
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usan Petricic was born in Belgrade in 1946, and he lived in Zemun from the time he was born and considers himself a citizen of Zemun first and foremost. He graduated from the graphics department of the Faculty of Applied Arts in Belgrade, and afterwards he quickly became the cartoon editor in Vecernje Novosti. In the meantime, he and the legendary Belgrade writer Dusko Radovic became inseparable. Poletarac and many other projects will be remembered from that period. A large number of works remain from Petricic’s Belgrade period (19651991) – starting with children’s books, posters and calendars, through to cartoons and illustrations published in Knjizevne novine, Vidici, Poletarac, Kekec, Vecernje Novosti, TV novosti, Ekonomska politika, Nin, to drawings made for animated films, theatre costume designs and intros and sets for TV shows. After a short spell in Rome (1992-93), Petricic left for Toronto, where he drew cartoons and illustrations for The New Times Book Review, The Wall Street Journal, The Toronto Star and Scientific American, and received a large number of awards for children’s book illustrations. Steven Heller, former art director of The
New Times Book Review, says that he fell in love with Petricic’s work straight away because of his amazing ability to find the essence of a text and turn it into an accurate visual representation. A sense of humour in his approach to topics, but also the ability to give his creations the asset of ‘a magical dimension of thought, an idea concentrated down to an essential symbol and root,’ contributed to him receiving a more apt name for his line of work – ‘characterist,’ and not caricaturist. He also worked with writer Ljubivoje Rsumovic as well, leading to the famous illustrations of Rsumovic’s book ‘Jos nam samo ale fale’. Then there’s also ‘Beograd i beogradjani,’ which he worked on with Dusko Radovic to promote the Serbian capital. That’s when his famous illustration ‘Battle for Belgrade’ was created. He also designed album covers for Arsen Dedic and Dragan Lakovic, as well as notebook covers for the gallery ‘Sebastijan.’ Dusan Petricic is living and working in Canada today. He has four children with his wife Dragana Varagic, an actress, Milos, Gordana, Irena and Mihaela, as well as grandchildren Lara, Rastko, Andreja, Katarina and Irma. CorD / November 2008 63
INTERVIEW
Goran Marković, a director
A Journey Through Time Goran Marković is one of Serbia and former Yugoslavia’s most popular directors. The beginning of October saw the opening night of the film “On the Road”, Marković`s first film for six years. Just before the opening night, “On the Road” was chosen as the Serbian candidate for an Oscar, and at the World Film Festival it won two awards, one for the best direction and the FIPRESCI award for the best film as voted by the international panel
Goran Marković’s ‘On the Road’ is awarded by the Quebec Film Festival
uring the following month, Marković’s play “The Falsifier” will be performed in the Belgrade Drama Theatre – our contribution to the international theatre project “After the Fall”, dedicated to the twenty year anniversary the fall of the Berlin wall, a project in which 13 countries are involved. These two changes in Marković’s career are the reason for our conversation.
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himself or is asked by others. It can be a living hell. That world sometimes can really be unbearable. I know directors who in one moment began to refuse making decisions. They simply could not go on any longer. The last decision, when one can finally say that a film is finished, is certainly the most difficult one. Especially in a making a film like “On the Road” which has been in production for years.
You wrote the screenplay for “On the Road” 13 years ago. After such a long wait, did you feel relieved after the credits finally rolled on the opening night? As a director, can you finally say the film is finished for you now? It is a difficult question. Directing is actually an incessant decision-making process. This screenplay or that one? What genre will the film be? Which actors to chose? Where to place the camera? Is this shot good enough or I should make one more? Where to edit in this take? Faster or slower, louder or quieter... and so on and so forth. Incessant judging and answering thousands of questions that a director asks
At the press conference held after the completion of the film, you described
64 CorD / November 2008
the film as a war comedy, which is more than an unusual description. What can you tell us about that? “On the Road” is all about a crash of spheres, about the clash between one completely closed world, distant from the reality, and of another which is a bloody and down to earth world of warriors. These two extremes juxtaposed in my film should provoke laughter, but maybe some questions too. It should certainly provoke some discussion of issues that are often not talked about.
DECISIONS
A RECORD
AWARDS
Directing is actually an incessant decisionmaking process. The last decision, when one can finally say that a film is finished, is certainly the most difficult, especially in a making a film like “On the Road”
A film is a record of the moment when it was made. Not only about the historical aspect of a period but also about people’s way of thinking back then, what their priorities were and what their tastes were like
Awards are not important. I realised that long time ago. People forget awards, but whether or not they forget the film is the real test.A few of my films are still being watched. I challenge anyone to remember what awards they received
A scen from the Bosnian war comedy: pictured front - Gordan Kičić, Jelena Đokić & Mira Furlan “On the Road” has united producers from Serbia, Bosnia and Hertsegovina, Croatia and Slovenia. Just like old times, isn’t it? It is more of a necessity rather than Yugoslav nostalgia. In these parts it is simply impossible to form a film crew of quality and find the funding for production unless various artists and funds from neighbouring countries are combined. Luckily we all speak similar languages and have similar obsessions so it is not difficult to combine people from Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Slovenia. Actual shooting is easier. It’s simply the best people doing their job the best way they can. Eurimages money has been invested into the film. To what extent will that help the film’s chances of being displayed in foreign cinemas? That is not only a great financial help but also a European stamp of approval. Shooting a film with the help of Eurimages says something civilised about the production. This serious organisation has supported nothing valueless. Of course, it cannot guarantee the quality, but it certainly will not support something that has no value. Their help meant a lot to us both materially and personally. Svetozar Cvetković, the founder and the owner of Testament Films and co-producer of “On the Road`” has said that nobody in Europe can shoot a film on their own and that co-production is something that goes without saying as necessary, especially for international productions. What’s your opinion on this?
That is certainly true. It’s important to get more than one side to a story. It would be wrong to make films with general themes about everything and everybody, which spread themselves to thin. My conviction is that local films with global effect should be made. Each of us knows their native country best, the milieu in which we live and that is what films should re-
only about the historical aspect of a period but also about people’s way of thinking back then, what their priorities were and what their tastes were like. Films are like pebbles that their authors leave behind themselves on the road along which they are walking. While walking (creating) they mark their trail through time and human values.
Mira Furlan flect. Films have to have universal meanings and generally recognised values. Did knowing that your film would be seen as one more proof that we as a race are warlike affect your writing of the screenplay? Bearing in mind that art has the power to influence consciousness, should it make reality look more beautiful or depict it the way it is? Neither of the two. A film is a record of the moment when it was made. Not
What was the Banja Luka audience reaction bearing in mind that the story of the film takes place on their soil? Exceptional. I think this film means a lot for the Republic of Srpska. Above all, its name is associated with positive phenomena such as the production of a good film. It proves that they can think critically about war. It is not a propaganda image or unbalanced vision of one side of a war, but a critical look back at questions which are very uncomfortable, questions people CorD / November 2008 65
INTERVIEW
A scene from the film ‘On the Road’: Dragan Nikolić, Mira Furlan & Jelena Đokić now have the strength to answer. Had you expected the award in Montreal? I had feared that this story would require a lot of information and background knowledge but it turned out that everybody reacted strongly simply on an emotional level.
tremendous changes in our country. I would say the greatest changes in the region. Slobodan Milošević and his wife’s attempt to save Communism turned into terror for which we paid a high price. Whole generations lost their chance to develop normally, hundreds of thousands of young people left Serbia in droves. The
keep flourishing. These terrible events that have befallen us since the fall of the Berlin Wall will be the backdrop for my play. What I would like to happen is a comedy to be born out of all of this. My way of surviving has always been to mock very serious issues. I could not survive them in any other way.
There is an opinion that awards, apart from telling us about the quality of the film in question, tell us something about panel’s attitude towards the country from which the film’s creators have come. Do you agree? Awards are not important. I realised that long time ago. I tend not to think about them too much. People forget awards, but whether or not they forget the film is the real test. A few of my films are still being watched. I challenge anyone to remember what awards they received. Some ten years before “On the Road” you were shooting documentaries, recording reality to show others your view of the world and how things could be changed. Now, years later, do you think you have achieved that goal? Of course not. Films cannot be used for anything practical - they are not for everyday use. You can not change anything with a film, apart from the human soul. What kind of picture of the fall of the Berlin Wall will your play show? Pulling the Berlin Wall down caused 66 CorD / November 2008
Tihomir Stanić country in which life had been easy suddenly became incredibly complicated. The disintegration of the world in which we had lived up to then was misused for crime and eventually as a reason for the terrible war in which Serbia lost most. People were exposed to terrible suffering and humiliations, which gave birth to various pathologies. Being unused to facing the truth we allowed warped minds to
Do you consider the Oscar nomination to be your greatest success in film? What will happen if you win? No. What I see as my greatest success are my films that have survived the test of time without becoming meaningless and stupid. Those that remained like the pebbles on the road. On the road along which new ones and better ones are coming.
CULTURE
Exhibition on the East German secret service
Life with Stasi Some say that close to 91,000 people worked for the Stasi in 1989, and that the secret service had over 100,000 so-called unofficial associates, most of who worked in East Germany. After the two Germanies united in 1991, the Law on Stasi Documentation was passed, which provided an opportunity for German citizens to see with their own eyes the files that the secret service had kept on them. The cells that once housed the prisoners of the notorious Stasi BY ŽARKA RADOJA
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idden cameras, microphones, special handkerchiefs for collecting scents, suitacases for smuggling people over the border, photographs, documents and a host of other exhibits can be seen at the October exhibition called ’The State Security – Guarantor of SED Dictatorship’
He added that the Democratic Republic of Germany collapsed but that the mountains of files collected by the Stasi remained. The files, when put together, were so many that they could fill up 180 kilometres of shelves. “These files speak of every day operations of the Stasi which worked against human rights, and you can clearly see the
Goodbye, Lenin
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uying a new car or any other goods from the Federal Republic of Germany was deemed suspicious by the Stasi agents who were so fearful of any trace of Western culture, like Coca-Cola, the Beatles or the Rolling Stones, coming to East Germany. The Stasi agents also found small things - like walking through woods after work - suspicious. At the beginning of the 1970s, the agents noticed that certain sculptors, painters, architects, and teachers were gathering in the house of Peter Rompf, to talk about culture, philosophy, politics and state development. Their flats and studios were subsequently raided and listening devices placed. Three of them, together with their families, were forced to move out, some lost their jobs and one of them had to be treated in a psychiatric hospital. Rompf defected to the Federal Republic of Germany.
at which just some of the documents about the work of the notorious Ministry for State Security, called the Stasi, were shown. The exhibition in Serbia was put together by the Goethe Institute and the Federal Committee for the State Security Files of the former Democratic Republic of Germany. Germany’s Ambassador to Serbia, Wolfram Maas, said at the exhibition opening in Dom Sindikata that “when you say ‘Stasi’ you immediately think of the horror that was infamous even outside of Germany”. “This term can be used in describing a state which is oppressive, as well as a synonym for a totalitarian dictatorship” said Maas.
resistance that the people showed against this organization” Mass said. The Ministry for State Security or Stasi, was an internal and external security and investigation service in charge of investigating ‘political criminal acts’. The Stasi was the government’s internal instrument for breaking down and supervising certain activities and was used to support the authorities. In addition to mass monitoring and intimidation, the Stasi also terrorized and tortured the political opposition and critics of the regime. Some say that close to 91,000 people worked for the Stasi in 1989, and that the secret service had over 100,000 so-
called unofficial associates, most of who worked in East Germany. After the two Germanies united in 1991, the Law on Stasi Documentation was passed, which provided an opportunity for German citizens to see with their own eyes the files that the secret service had kept on them. Dr Georg Herbstreet from the Stasi Federal Files Committee says that exhibitions about the secret service, which caused so much grief to the citizens of East Germany, are taking place all over Germany. Before Belgrade, the exhibition was presented in Lithuania, Poland, Hungary, Romania and Slovakia. Herbstreet says that during the 1980s the Stasi had a limited cooperation with the Yugoslav UDBA, which, according to him, was never a trusted partner of the Stasi. Even Herbstreet, although living in West Germany, had a Stasi file because of his contacts with certain dissident circles from East Germany. The Stasi was a secret intelligence service, political secret police and a state investigator in political cases all rolled into one. The service used methods similar to those in the USSR – arbitrary arrests and imprisonment, physical torture, staged public processes and long jail sentences. According to the Federal Files Commissioner, Marianne Birthler, the Stasi was formed in February 1950 and was a ’sword and armour’ in the hands of the state party, the SED. Abolishment of the Ministry for State Security (MfS) was one of the main demands of the demonstrators in the autumn of 1989, just before the Berlin Wall came down. CorD / November 2008 67
CULTURE
MEMORIAL PLATE TO PETAR KONJOVIC UVEILED
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memorial plate to the famous Serbian composer Petar Konjovic (1883-1970) was formally unveiled on the 23rd of October in the building at Resavska 32 in Belgrade, in which Konjovic lived and worked for 30 years. The plate is the work of sculptor Gradimir Rajkovic, and it was unveiled by composer Milan Mihajlovic. Historian Emilija Kosanovic, who lives on the third floor of the same building, held a speech for guests who attended the unveiling. The representatives of the Assembly of the City of Belgrade, which made the idea that the Composers’ Association of Serbia had come up with possible in the first place, were present at the formal unveiling.
BALKANIME AWARD he Israeli Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design has won a trophy and diplomas for the best film school at the international ‘Balkanima’ animated film festival held in October in Belgrade. The film ‘Beton’, co-directed by Ariel Belinco and Michael Faust, distinguished itself with its originality in the portrayal of an anti-war theme, said the festival organizers. The film ‘Kafana’ by Mina Cvetinic, with its theme of ‘how sweet it is to do nothing,’ was declared the best student film. Three special awards were also given to the films: ‘Office Noise’ (Denmark), ‘Iron Tower’ (Germany) and ‘The Attic’ (Netherlands). The idea for the festival came from the Serbian branch of the International
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Animated Film Association (ASIFA), while its organization was taken over by the Academic Film Centre of the Cultural Centre ‘Studentski grad.’
TEARS FOR SALE WINS AN AWARD AT THE WARSAW FILM FESTIVAL
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he film ‘Tears for Sale,’ directed by Uros Stojanovic, which competed in the Free Spirit section at the 24th International Film Festival in Warsaw held from 10 to 19 October, has was awarded Best Movie in a unanimous decision by the jury. The film competed against 15 other entries from the USA, Spain, Switzerland, Netherlands, Korea, Poland, Russia, Mexico, New Zealand and Brazil, and the film was fantastically well received by the audience – the room was packed during all three screenings at the festival. 68 CorD / November 2008
At the closing ceremony on the 18th of October the award was given to the film’s leading actress Katarina Radivojevic and Jelena Mirkovic, the assistant executive producer at Blue Pen, the film’s production company. The Free Spirit section, within which ‘Tears for Sale’ was screened, comprises innovative, independent and rebellious films from all over the world, whose common attribute is that they bring something new to their country’s cinematography.
The aim of the festival is to promote animation in Serbia, in the Balkans and in the countries of Southeast Europe, as well as to get bring those countries closer to the European mainstream. The festival also aims to help young writers and directors from all over Europe develop their own sense of art and tolerance by introducing them to the methods and achievements of more developed productions, and the new technologies that are changing the film industry. The patrons of the festival are the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Serbia and the Secretariat for Culture of the Assembly of the City of Belgrade. 40TH BEMUS CLOSED
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he 4 0 th Belgrade M u s i c Festival came to a close in the Sava Centre with the staging of the first Serbian ballet ‘Legend of Ohrid’ by Stevan Hristic, which was accompanied by a film specially created for the occasion. To mark the 50 years since the death of Stevan Hristic (1885-1958) and the 50 years since the last staging of ‘Legend of Ohrid,’ the RTS Symphony Orchestra conducted by Bojan Sudjic performed the ballet for the first time in its new and longer version, edited by academic Dejan Despic and with a duration of 100 minutes. The music was complimented by the film which showed images of a theme which reflected the theme of the ballet; grape harvesting, lakes, playful young people and two lovers (played by the dancers Dalija Acin and Zeljko Grozdanovic, and whose moves were choreographed by Iskra Sukarova). This year’s BEMUS was opened on the 3rd of October with Zoran Eric’s composition ‘Entr’acte’ (‘Between Acts’) performed by the Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra and conducted by Mark Gorenstein. The BEMUS audience had the opportunity to listen to a wide range of some of the best music in the world, and not just classical pieces. Guests also enjoyed performances of modern ballet, opera, and jazz. GREAT INTEREST IN THE DEPECHE MODE CONCERT
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n just three days, more than 50% percent of the 10,000 tickets for the concert of the famous British band Depeche Mode were sold. The concert is to be held on the 20th May at Usce in Belgrade.
FIVE EXHIBITS OF THE BELGRADE MUSEUM OF APPLIED ARTS IN LONDON
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ive exhibits from the collection of the Belgrade Museum of Applied Arts have been included in the great exhibition ‘Byzantium 330-1453’ which opened on the 25th of October in the Royal Academy of Arts in London and which will run until the 22nd of March next year.
ning of the 15th century. The cameo of Christ Pantocrator dating back to the 13th century is also on display; its counterpart, Virgin Hodegetria, is being kept in the Hilandar monastery. The Belgrade Museum of Applied Arts is also presenting in London a Byzantine parade sword from the end of the 15th century and a bronze incense burner, as well as a bronze bell from 1432, a gift from a Rhodopes nobleman to the Patriarchate of the Pec monastery. The bell is a rarity because the Turks destroyed most Serbian bells during the 17th century. The exhibition in London also has some valuables from the Church of St Mark in Venice on display, as well as rare exhibits from Byzantine art collections from various European countries, and especially from Russia and Ukraine, as well as Egypt and USA.
The exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts in London is the largest exhibition of Byzantine art in Great Britain in the past 50 years, and it is being held in cooperation with the Benaki Museum in Athens and with the participation of 80 cultural institutions from around the world.
Cameo with Christ Pantocrator Constantinople, early thirteenth century (cameo); Serbia, Peć or Prizren, early seventeenth century (the fitting) Jasper green, cutting; silver, hammering gilding; enamel (blue and green); carnelian, mother-of-pearl, glass paste Cameo L – 40 mm, width 35 mm Fitting L – 72 mm, width 60 mm MAA inv. no. 4588 The exhibition has 300 displays including icons, parts of frescos, miniature mosaics and works in ivory, enamel and gold, as well as works in silver. The icon of St Demetrius is among the exhibits from the Museum of Applied Arts. It was painted on Mt Athos in the Moravic style between the the beginend of the 14th and
Icon of St Demetrios Hilandar (?), End of the fourteenth century, beginning of the fifteenth century, The Moravian school Tempera on board 34.3 x 26.5 cm MAA, Belgrade, inv. no. 1351
Bell Serbia, 2 August 1432 Donation by feudal lord Nikola Rodop from the period of reign of despot Stefan Lazarević and despot Djurdje Branković Bronze, casting H 700 mm; R 550 mm Ownership of the Peć Patriarchate
Sword Byzantium. Constantinople or Thessalonica, fourteenth – first half of the fifteenth centuries Steel, forging, engraving; gold, casting; inlaying (damascening) Sword – L 1110 mm; Scimitar – L 985 mm MAA inv. no 1120
Incense box (portable) Serbia, Janjevo, fourteenth century Bronze, casting, openwork 110 x 125 x 305 mm MAA inv.no. 161 CorD / November 2008 69
CULTURE
AUTUMN FASHION WEEK HELD
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he Belgrade BECK’S FASHION WEEK, the 24th so far, was held from the 22nd to the 29th of October under the patronage of the City Assembly, in some of the city’s most exclusive locations, including the EXPO XXI hall. Boris Nikolic’s fashion show was held at the very start of the event – a designer who died this year, but who was supposed to celebrate ten years of working in fashion at this year’s Fashion Week. At the very opening of the event in the EXPO XXI centre, a retrospective fashion show of Boris Nikolic’s designs was presented – a talented designer who left a deep mark on the Belgrade fashion scene. New collections from other well established Serbian fashion designers were presented at the event – Bata Spasojevic, Dejan Despotovic, Aleksandar Protic, Slobodan Mihajlovic, Pedja Neric, Doda Komad, Irena Grahovac, Darko Kostic, Dragan Ognjenovic, but also those from young new designers, including Gordana Manojlovic, Katarina Kovacevic, Emilija Petrovic and Andrijana Milicevic. Some global fashion houses also chose to display their collections, including Todor, Fratteli, FHM, Gaastra, Pull and Bear, Bugatti, Buzz, and Hugo Boss. The accompanying programme consisted of an exhibition of fashion accessories displaying glasses (by Yason and Italy Line), handbags (by Velibor Antonijevic, Jasmina Sanader and Tanja Cicanovic Nikolic), gloves (by Evica Milovanov Penezic) and shoes (by Danijela Biskup), as well as a Forum for fashion designers, clothing industry professionals and Southeast European institutions of education. The organizer of the Belgrade Fashion Week was the Click Fashion Studio from Belgrade.
Depeche Mode will be one of several bands to appear in Belgrade as part of the Tuborg Green Fest. The promotional price for the tickets is RSD2,390, while the regular price will be RSD2,990. The tickets for the Fun Pit, that is, the area close to the stage cost 70 CorD / November 2008
RSD3,990, and the VIP tickets are being sold at a price of RSD7,500. This will be the first time that Depeche Mode have played in Belgrade, 29 years since the group was formed and after 75 million albums and singles have been sold. As part of their stadium tour entitled ‘Tour of the Universe 2009,’ they will perform in 28 European cities. The band members have said that they expect a good concert in Belgrade because they know they have many loyal fans in this part of Europe. Depeche Mode was formed in 1980 in England during the heyday of the new wave and new romanticism. Vince Clark, Andrew Fletcher and Martin Gore were the founders. They appeared together before as well, under various names, and when the singer David Gahan joined they named themselves Depeche Mode (after the French fashion magazine). They have published 11 official studio albums to date, ending with ‘Playing the Angel’ from 2005. The new, 12th Depeche Mode album is set for release in spring 2009. Tuborg Green Fest is organized by Carlsberg Serbia and State of Exit, in cooperation with the Live Nation agency.
GREAT NAMES OF THE MUSIC SCENE AT KOLARAC
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ix concerts will be held in the Kolarac Foundation from November 2008 to May 2009 as part of the series of concerts ‘Great Names of the Music Scene’ at which some of the leading world musicians will be performing. Japanese violinist Goto Midori will take to the stage on the 29th of November and perform the works of Bach, Shostakovich, Schubert and Faure while accompanied by pianist Charles Abramovich. Goto Midori was born in 1971 in Osaka, Japan. She started playing the vi-
olin in early childhood, and she had her first public performance when she was seven. Today, Midori is a world famous violinist who performs in over 90 concerts annually. The UN Secretary-General Ban KiMoon declared her a Messenger of Peace on the 21st of September 2007. One of the highlights of the series scheduled for the 4th of February is the performance of the double bass ensemble ‘Bassiona Amorosa’. The group is made up of musicians from the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Russia, Belarus, Georgia and Serbia. Turkish pianist Fazil Say will hold a concert on the 15th of March when he’ll perform the works of Bach, Beethoven, Say, Ravel and Mussorgsky. Fazil Say was born in 1970 in Ankara where he completed piano and composition studies at the State Conservatory. He regularly performs with the philharmonic orchestras from New York, Baltimore, Saint Petersburg, Israel and Vienna, as well as with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Concertgebau from Amsterdam and the French National Orchestra. Pianist trio ‘Berezovsky, Makhtin, Kniazev’ will play on the 22nd of April when they perform the works of Dvorak and Rachmaninoff, and on the 22nd of May the Russian National Orchestra conducted by Mikhail Pletniov will hold a concert in the Kolarac Foundation.
The Russian National Orchestra, one of the best orchestras in the world, together with pianist Alexander Gavrylyuk, will play the works of Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff and Shostakovich at this Belgrade concert. Tickets for the full run of the ‘Great Names of the Music Scene’ series are on sale at the box office of the Kolarac Foundation with the price of RSD6,500, while the tickets for individual concerts will be on sale a month before the concerts themselves. SERBIAN DESIGNERS IN STOCKHOLM
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hirteen Serbian artist-designers presented their work in Stockholm from the 17th to the 24th October as part of the Belgrade Connection project and under the organization of the Cultural Front. The goal of this project was to present artists who grew up, got their education or developed their artistic expression during the nineties in Serbia. Over the course of the seven days, the Serbian designers presented their collections of jewellery and clothes, while a costume
designer from Belgrade, Magdalena Klasnja, and an artist from Sweden, Ulrika Gunnarsdotter, created a collection entitled ‘The New Folk Costume,’ inspired by the traditional costume. The photographs of Belgrade by Stanislav Milojkovic were also displayed portraying how our capital has changed from the eighties of the twentieth century to this day. The Belgrade Connection project is part of the Serbia Redesign initiative started during spring this year with a letter exchange between artists from Sweden and Serbia. The Serbian designers’ visit to Sweden was supported by the Ministry for Diaspora of the Republic of Serbia.
CULTURE CALENDAR
POP, ROCK, ETHNO, JAZZ Shaolin Monks
Sava Center, Great Hall 6. November, 20 00
Highly respected and acclaimed musician Zvonko Bogdan will perform traditional songs with a tambura orchestra consisting of 16 musicians.
Sergej Ćetković
Sava Center, Great Hall 20. November, 20 30
The Glenn Miller orchestra
Shaolin Monastery monks together with Kallar fighters from India are performing in this new Kung-fu spectacle Holy mountain Song Shan is located in the heart of China. More than 72 monasteries and holy places, as a place of mystical powers and magical beauty, for centuries has been the meeting place of philosophy, founders of religions and mudraca. At it’s footage, one of the most popular of the monasteries is located - Shaolin Monastery the birth place of Zen Budhism. Mysterious monks of Shaolin Kung-fu live there. With the assistence of meditation and incredible phyiscal strength they are capable of confonting the Laws of Phyisic: „Your mind can control your bofy” - is the lofe motto of the saints that use this combat virtue exclusively for defence and never atack. At the beggining of the new show, videos of Holy mountain Nwith the original locations will be shown, which is a prelude for the Monks exercise on the scene. Immpresive demonstrations, from a 7-year-old monk student to the oldest master, will show the strength that derives from the inner peace, the audience will also participate in practical exercises. This immpresive show so far, in the last 10 years has seen more that 3.000.000 viewers in the whole world. Zvonko Bogdan: Songs for tambura
Sava Center, Great Hall 14. November, 20 30
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Sava Center, Great Hall 15. November, 20 00 Conductor:Ray Mc Vay Glenn Miller UK orchetra was formed in 1988 in cooperation with the „Glenn Miller Productions” from New York. The orchestra has an identycal construction of musicians that Glenn Miller himself had; it has it’s own leader, 5 saxophones, 4 trumpets, 4 trombones, a three-member rythm section and vocals. Singers perform as soloists and as part of a vocal group „The Moonlight Serenaders”. Also the „Uptown Hall Gang” will perform ian extraordinary dixyland band consisting of members of the lerger orchestra.
Glitter and magic of Glenn Miller’s music are bringing us to the 40’s of the XX c, the golden age of big bands. Authentic music of Glenn Miller is even more popular than ever. Gary Moore
Sava Center, Great Hall 16. November, 20 30 Gary Moore is acknowledged as one of the finest musicians that the British Isles has ever produced. In a career that dates back to the 1960s, there are few musical genres that he has not turned his adroit musical hand to, and has graced the line-ups ever several notable rock bands, Thin Lizzy, Colosseum II and Skid Row to name but three. With his latest studio album ‘Close As You Get’, Gary continues in a direction not too dissimilar from Old, New, Ballads, Blues. Mixing original tunes with some interesting Blues covers that Gary has rediscovered, whilst researching for his recent Planet Rock ‘Blues Power’, radio show (UK based digital/internet ‘radio’ station). Close As You Get showcases Moore’s exceptional talent as a guitarist and is destined to be one of the finest blues and guitar albums released in 2007. 2008, sees Gary continue the momentum of all the touring behind the ‘Close As You Get’, release. Shows were played in various European capitals and a number of festivals throughout 2007 and this is set to continue in 2008.
Popular Serbian pop singer of younger generation Jean Michel Jarre - Concert
08.11.2008. 20 00 Beogradska Arena French composer, performer and music producer Jean Michel Jarre will hold a concert on November 8th 2008 at Belgrade Arena, which is also the promoter of the event. He is regarded as a pioneer in the electronic, synthpop and New Age, as well as organiser of outdoor spectacles of his music which feature lights, laser displays and fireworks. Jarre has sold an estimated 80 million albums and singles. The beginning og Jarre`s career is marked by Oxigene, a hit which was made in 1970 and only included in his first album in 1976. From then followed true music masterpieces such as Geometry of Love, Aero, Aerozone, Chronology, Fishing junks at Sunset. Fitting his music masterpieces perfectly into most amazing stage effects at his concerts which are most frequently held outdoors and blending the existing architecture with the complicated system of lasers, fireworks and music, he creates a totally recognizable image and a new jenre both in music and concert performing art. Each concert`s theme is devoted to important events for particular regions, which makes his concerts really memorable. AOR (Paris, 1971), Destination Trocadero (Paris, 1989), Jarre Unplugged (Paris, 1095), Festa Italiana (Torino, 1995), UNESCO 50th Anniversary (Paris, 1997), Wetten, dass...? (Vienna, 1998), FIFA World Player 97 (Paris Dysneyland, 1998), France Festival (Tokio, 1998), FNAC Paris (Paris) were watched by millions of ec-
static people. As UNESCO`s Ambasador of Good Will on December 16th 2006 Jean Michel Jarre held a concert called Water for Life in the Sahara desert in Marocco. Since he has never before performed in our region, Jarre was delighted when he received the invitation, so we can expect an unforgetable concert at Belgrade Arena.
bands in Croatia. DiscographyDžinovski, In March 1993 G.A.D., In May 1995 Desetka, 1997 Pobjeda, 1999 Istočno od Gajnica, 2000
Program: D. Shostakovich: Ballet Suite No. 1 L. van Beethoven: Concerto for piano and orchestra No. 1 B. Britten: Sinfonia da Requiem J. Massenet: Scenes Dramatiques Kolarac Hall- Concerts in
No Smoking Orchestra
29.November 2008 20 00 Beogradska Arena Emir Kusturica and No Smoking Orchestra will appear in concert on November 29th 2008 at Belgrade Arena. The band was founded back in 1980 under the name Zabranjeno pusenje, but after the war in Bosnia the members of the band who had moved to Belgrade continued to work under the name No Smoking Orchestra. The Belgrade concert, which will be held on November 29th - the biggest national holiday of former Yugoslavia, topic of their song The Republic Day - will be this year`s third concert of the band in Serbia. It has been added to the world tour together with the new October and November dates in Chile, Argentina, Mexico, Uruguay, Italy, Norway and Greece. After the tour the band will start recording a new studio album announced for next year. At the concert in Belgrade Arena Emir Kusturica and No Smoking Orchestra will play their greatest hits of unza time music. As a special treat for all the fans of Dr Nele Karajlic and No Smoking Orchestra the band will play songs such as Guzonjin sin, Pisonja i Zuga, Vukota, Na strazi pored Prizrena, Gile sampion, Devojcice kojima mirise koza, Hase, Zenica bluz, Dan republike, and many more. Special guests at the concert will be Vrelo, an ethno group from Ruma. Information about the concert and ticket reservations avilable on: www.arenabeogrea.com i www.ganemfactory.com
HLADNO PIVO
22. November 2008. 21:00 h HALA SPORTOVA - NOVI BEOGRAD Hladno pivo (trans. “Cold beer”) is a Croatian punk rock band. It is one of most popular rock
Live concert, Šamar, 2003 Knjiga žalbe, 2007 Awards Porin 1993 - best alternative rock album Porin 2000 - best video spot, best alternative rock album Porin 2004 - best video spot, best vocal collaboration, best vocal group, best rock album . BALLET
Super Stars of the Russian Ballet Sava Center, Great Hall 8. November, 20 00 SPECIAL EVENTS
50 years of TV Belgrade Sava Center, Great Hall 28. November, 20 00
November
5. November, 20 00 Tanja Đorgovska, violoncello Program- Brams, Schostakovitch, Paganinni 6. Novembar, 20 00 National Orchestra Kapitol- Toulouze Conductor- Tugan Sohiev Soloist- Nelson Freire, piano Program- Mesian, Frank, Musorgsky, Ravel 16. November, 20 00 Youth Philharmony Orchestra Borislav Pašćan Conductor- Đorđe Pavlović Program- Božić, Tchaickovsky, Hristić 18. November Ensemble Kolo 19. November, Music Gallery, 18 00 Nina Sofronski, piano
CLASSICAL MUSIC Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra
All Concerts are in Kolarac Hall at 20 00 2. November Miguel Gomez-Martinez, conductor Eduardo Fernandez, guitar Program: J. Turina: La procesion del Rocio J. Rodrigo: Fantasia para un gentilhombre for guitar and orchestra J. Brahms: Symphony No. 3 9. November 2007 Peter Leonard, conductor Rascher Saxophone Quartet Program: A. Vrebalov: Orbits P. Glass: Concerto for saxophone quartet and orchestra J. Sibelius: Symphony No. 2 16. November Bruno Cinquegrani, conductor Jasminka Stancul, piano
MARCOS VINICIUS, guitar (Brazil)
Wednesday, 12. November , 20:00 Art Center Guarnerius Leading performer among the guitar players of the new generation of international concert CorD / November 2008 73
CULTURE CALENDAR
artists, started his concert career at the age of fourteen and, since then, he has gained an increasing success of public and critics, playing in the most prestigious Brazilian and European cultural centres. He was only sixteen when he received the Honorary Diploma from the Cultural Department of Congonhas, a Brazilian city considered by UNESCO “World Historical Heritage” and, in 1984, he won, by common consent, the prestigious “National Villa-Lobos Musical Contest”. The excellent quality of his interpretations, together with a technique of a very high standard and a sound of exceptional beauty, have attracted the attention of several composers, Paolo Colombo and Antonio Brena in Italy and Julio Borges, Claudio Tupinamba and Alexandre Pilò in Brazil, who dedicated to him works for guitar of singular value. Marcos Vinicius is also present in the exclusive Dictionary “Guitar & Players” (published by Ashley Music Co., London) that counts the most qualified guitar players in the music world. At present, he is President of the Classical Guitar Academy in Milan. Program of the concert : Bonfà, Villa-Lobos, Pilò, Vinicius, Machado, classical songs from Brazil Under the patronage of BRAZILIAN EMBASSY IN BELGRADE FILM CINEMANIA
Main Program Sava Center, Great Hall 29. November a 20 00- Opening- BODY OF LIES – drama, Directed by Ridley Scott, cast: Leonardo Di Caprio, Russell Crowe 22.30 - DEATH RACE – action- Directed by Paul W.S. Anderson, cast: Jason Statham, Ian McShane, Tyrese Gibson 30. November 17.00 - DARK KNIGHT –action- Christopher Nolan, cast: Christian Bale, Heath Ledger, Aaron Eckhart 20.00 - EAGLE EYE – action- Directed by D.J. Caruso, cast: Shia LeBeouf, Michelle Monaghan, Billy Bob Thornton, Rosario Dawson 22.30 - BANGKOK DANGEROUS – actionDirected by Oxyde Pang Chun, cast: Nicolas Cage, Shaun Delaney 31. November74 CorD / November 2008
17.00 - SEX & CITY - Directed by Michael Patrick King, cast: Sarah Jessica Parker, Kim Cattrall, Cynthia Nixon, Kristin Davis 20.00 - VICKY, CRISTINA, BARCELONA
– comedy- Directed by Woody Alen, cast: Penelope Cruz, Rebeca Hall, Scarlett Johansson, Javier Bardem, Patricia Clarkson 22.30 - WARLORDS - action- Directed by Peter Chen, cast: Jet Lee, Andy Lau, Takeshi Kaneshiro 1. November 17.30 - CITY OF EMBER – adventureDirected by Gil Kenan, cast: Bill Muray, Tim Robbins, Martin Landau, Saoirse Ronan 20.00 - NIGHTS IN RODANTHE – dramaDirected by George C. Wolfe, cast: Richard Gere, Diana Lane, James Franko, Scott Glen 22.30- HELLBOY 2: THE GOLDEN ARMY - action- Directed by Guillermo Del Torro, cast: Ron Perlman, Selma Blair 2. November 17.30 - NEVER BACK DOWN – actionDirected by Jeff Wadlow, cast: Sean Farris, Amber Heard, Djimon Hounsou, Cam Gigandet 20.00 - RIGHTEOUS KILL – thriller, Directed by John Avnet, cast: Al Pacino, Robert De Niro 22.30- THE ROLLING STONES: SHINE A LIGHT - documentary- Directed by Martin Scorsese, apearance by: Mick Jagger and
Rolling Stones, Cristina Aguillera 3. November 17.30 - INDIANA JONES - action- Directed by Steven Spielberg, cast: Harrison Ford, Cate Blanchett, Shia LaBeouf 20.00 - THE TOURIST - thriller, Directed by Marcel Langenegger, cast: Hugh Jackman, Ewan McGregor, Michelle Wiliams 22.30- PINNEAPPLE EXPRESS – comedy , Directed by David Gordon Green, cast: Seth Rogen, James Franco, Danny McBride 4. November 17.30 - MAMMA MIA – comedy, musicle- Directed by Phyllida Lloyd, cast: Meryl Streep, Pierce Brosnan, Amanda Seyfried 20.00- THE WOMEN - ŽENE –comedyDirected by Diane English, cast: Meg Ryann, Eva Mendes, Jadda Pinket Smith, Annete Benning, Debra Messing, Bette Midler 22.30 - QUARANTINE – horrore , Directed by John Erick Dowdle, cast: Jay Hernandez, Rade Serbedžija, Jennifer Carpenter 5. November
17.30, 20.00 and 22.30 > QUANTUM OF SOLACE – adventure - Directed by Marc Forster, cast: Daniel Craig, Olga Kurylenko, Judi Dench, Mathieu Amalric THEATRE
Premiere in November KANDID, Voltaire Directed by Aleksandar Popovski Yugoslav Drama Theatre Voltaire’s Candide speaks about optimism as a philosophical idea and a point of view in life. Today, optimism is heavily problematical. It is even popular to say that an optimist is in deed only a poorly informed pessimist. Is it really so? Has the time come to turn this aphorism upside down and say that a Pessimist is, in fact, an Optimist without the courage to persist? In a stereotypical way of looking Candid is a good fool who gets fooled, offended and insulted by the mean and manipulative, say those who „know how life is“... But, is that really truth? Is it only Candide that is naive or are all those who think that they recognise and understand the construction of world? In our play all the roles stay in their own time, only Candide gets old. That’s why Candide is a tale of growing up and the termination from
Heaven, which are subjects that, again, necessarily are connected to optimism as a philosophical idea and a way of seeing life. Aleksandar Popovski The main roles in the play Candide will be played by Nikola Đuričko, while the other roles are given to: Branko Cvejić, Bogdan Diklić, Mihailo Janketić, Nataša Šolak, Gordana Đurđević, Nikola Simić, Vojin Ćetković, Goran Šušljik, Srđan Timarov, Milena Ražnatović, Vuk Kostić, Dragan Jovanović, Tijana Mladenović, Marinko Madžgalj, Dubravko Jovanović, Ljubomir Bandović, Marko Baćović... The set designer is Sven Jonke, the costumes are by Lana Cvijanović, the composer is Kiril Džajkovski and the dramatist is Miloš Krečković. This is the first time that Aleksandrar Popovski directs a play in the YDT. ART
18. November- 13. December French Cultural Center PHOTO EXHIBITION – Henry Cartie Breson
SAVA CENTRE Film Festival Contemporary Russian film Sava Center, Amphitheater
27 November- 30. November The festival is realized in cooperation with the Association of Serbian students from Russian and Soviet Universities, under the auspices of the Embassy of Russian Federation in Serbia. Ticket price: 250 CSD 27. November 18.00 and 20.00 Father
Director: Ivan Solovov Genre: war/drama Russia, 2007 Duration: 82 min The war has finished, but instead of luck and relief Alexej Ivanov feels bitterness and fear. Should he return home, but - what if his children don’t remember him, when he left they were small? Does his wife Lyuba remember him?Destiny brings together Alexey and Masha, a girl that is going to her hometown where noone is there anymore. When the train stops at Masha’s hometown, Alexey leaves the train with her and stays with hew for a couple of days...
have a newcomer Kostya, the son of Zhenya Lukashin from his new marriage, that is also unsuccesful. Old friends persuade Kostya to prepare a New Year’s magic on his father and go to Sankt Peterburg... 30. November 18.00 and 20.00 Hero Ilya Muromec and Monster nightingale-thug
Director: Vladimir Toropčin Genre: animated / adventure / comedy Russia, 2007 Duration: 75 min Russia is famous for it’s heroic heroes and thugy thugs...There is the dukest Duke who monitors everything and implies the Law when where needed. And now, he has quarelled with the hero Ilya Muromec, and at the same time he suffered quite a damage from the Monster nightingale-thug... The Apocalyps code
Director: Vadim Šmelev Genre: war/adventure Russia, 2007 Duration: 105 min Terrorist no.1, Jhafad Ben Zajidi, has stolen four nuclear missiles from an american sub-
The game
Director: Aleksandar Rogožkin Genre: comedy Russia, 2008 Duration: 90 min The film plot is pivot around the base where the preparations of the Russian football team is taking place. The entire nation is concentrated on them, just a few days prior to their important match... Irony of fate (2)
Exhibition, organised in the Month of the photography, has been organised by French Cultural Center in Belgrade and Photo agency Magnum from Paris, with the support of Meridian Bank Credit Agricole Group Exhibtion presents 54 photographs of one of the most popular and most significant French photographer, establisher of the Magnum Agency (in 1947) Breson would celebrate 100 birthday this year- exhibition of selected photographs marks 100 years from his death. Henri Cartier-Bresson (August 22, 1908 – August 3, 2004) was a French photographer considered to be the father of modern photojournalism, an early adopter of 35 mm format, and the master of candid photography. He helped develop the “street photography” style that has influenced generations of photographers that followed.
Director: Timur Bekmambetov Genre: comedy / melodrama Russia, 2007 Duration: 115 min
marine, hiding them in the biggest megapolises in the world. The Secret Service is starting a search on him, implementing one of their agents - Agent Marie in his circle of friends... Muha
Since the New Year when Zhenya Lukashin has met his Nadya 30 years have passed. Their relationship has changed in time, they are separated and she is returning to Sankt Peterburg. Old friends are still visiting the sauna, but they
Director: Vladimir Kot Genre: drama Russia, 2008 Duration: 107 min Driver for long destinations Fyodor Muhin is a batchelor, much loved by women, but he doen’t remember all of the women he was with. he doesn’ even remember the teacher Mashe from a small town on Ural mountain, from whom he receives a telegram with an apel to come as soon as possible. Masha does prior to his arrival, and Fyodor gets the keys to her house and a daughter Muha... 28. November , 29. November 18.00 and 20.00 CorD / November 2008 75
LIFESTYLE & LEISURE
Traditional Recipes from a Holy Sanctuary
Cooking on Mount Athos The famous monasteries of Hilandar adorn Athos
It’s a familiar yuletide image; tables heaving under the weight of stuffed glazed turkeys, roasted potatoes, prunes wrapped in bacon and brandy butter. Many the afternoon lost to that last cup of mulled wine, many the breakfast of leftover roast turkey eaten. BY RICHARD WORDSWORTH
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raditionally, the Christmas period is a time for a guilty spot of over-indulgence, while the New Year is the time for resolutions and promises of an altogether more wholesome year to come. But for those looking to make a serious commitment to healthy eating this January, help is at hand from a somewhat unlikely source. Father Epifanios Milopotaminos, an Orthodox Christian monk who prefers to be called a cook rather than a chef, has been preparing the food at the holy sanctuary of Mount Athos in Greece for almost four decades. Following the traditional rec76 CorD / November 2008
ipes laid down 100 years ago, the dishes he prepares are hearty and simple, using only ingredients found locally around the monastery. Up until now his recipes have been the preserve of other monks in the sanctu-
ary, but the release of his new cookbook, “Cooking on Mount Athos”, has opened up these culinary traditions to the public, as well as transforming him into something of a celebrity. The book contains 126 of Father Epifanios’ recipes, using simple ingredients from local vegetables and herbs to fresh fish. However, due to the strict dietary regime of the 20 monasteries located on Athos, readers will find no recipes involving meat or dairy, and no desserts. Missing too are any complicated preparation instructions – ingredients are add-
COOK, NOT A CHEF
MONK TV STAR
Father Epifanios - who calls himself a cook, not a chef - says his meals are rooted as much in centuriesold church practices as in common sense. Unfashionable ingredients such as broad beans, artichokes and okra, which many older Greeks still associate with poverty and often are ignored by the young, remain staples here. “People are less in touch with their natural surroundings nowadays,” Father Epifanios says.“They used to eat what they found around them and what they could gather. “Now they try Chinese, Indian food, and dishes from - I don’t know Finland before they realize that what they really liked all along was the meals their grandmother made them.”
Epifanios already has appeared on a popular Greek cooking show and his publisher, Synchronoi Ozizontes, says the leather-bound cookbook has sold 12,000 copies, a healthy figure for the local market.Athens nutrition scientist Paraskevas Papachristou says books such as Father Epifanios’ get a great deal of attention because Greeks generally want to eat healthier. ’’Monks at Mount Athos don’t eat meat.The word butter is never mentioned in the book, and we don’t add flour to thicken sauces.We just let the ingredients boil down.’’ Slow cooking suits the heavily bearded monks, who rise well before dawn and spend much of their day in prayer. ’’We have a lot of time, without families, wives and children to tend to,’’ Epifanios says.
ed to large pots and cooked slowly over a log fire, just as they have been prepared on Athos for generations. The popularity of Father Epifanios’ book isn’t down to simple nostalgia for the traditional home-style cooking being erod-
Mackerel baked with tomatoes
ed by pre-prepared and microwaveable food, however. Studies by Greek universities have shown that the lack of red meat and abundance of fruit and vegetables in the monks’ diet has serious health benefits for the residents of Mount Athos, not least a rate of cancer less than one quarter of the national average, making “Cooking on Mount Athos” an even tastier looking way of repenting for one’s Christmas indulgences.
4 cleaned mackerels, 2 big tomatoes, 2 spring onions, 10 cloves of garlic, 4 leaves of laurel, 2 dl olive oil, cumin, oregano, parsley, 2 dl of water, salt, pepper, lemon. arm the oven to 250°C, clean the fish in the meanwhile, dry them with paper. Cover the fish with salt, fill them up with one clove of garlic and laurel and put them in a casserole. Cut the rest of the garlic and the spring onions in small pieces and spread it over the fish. Cut the tomatoes in 0,5 cm slices and put them on the fish. Poure
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the olive oil carefully over the fish and then the oregano, cumin and pepper. Finally you add the parsley and the water (slowly in a corner, do not flush the herbs away). Put the meal in the middle of the oven (30-40 minutes, depends on how big the fish are). If the meat falls from the bones the meal is ready. Serve with lemon and rice. The Danish doctor drinks an Italian Frascati wine, I would recommend a Greek retsina, because the mackerel is a fat and tasty fish, that deserves a strong wine.
Braised cod with plums
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njoy the following recipe inspired by Father Epifanios Milopotaminos’ Cooking on Mount Athos: 3 Tbsp. (45mL) olive oil, 3 cloves garlic, minced, 1 large yellow onion, diced 1 lb. (1/2 kg.) fresh plums, halved and pitted, 1 1/2 lbs. 750g) fresh cod, 1/2 tsp. (2mL) kosher salt, Juice of 1 lemon, 2 Tbsp. (30mL) chopped fresh parsley, Ground black pepper, to taste. n a large, deep skillet over mediumhigh, combine olive oil, garlic and onion. Saute until onion just begins to soften, about three to four minutes. Add plums and saute another two minutes. Arrange cod over onions and plums, then add enough water to come halfway up cod. Sprinkle cod with salt, then bring water to a simmer, cover and cook 15 minutes, or until the cod flakes easily. Sprinkle lemon juice and parsley over cod, then season with pepper. Serves 4 to 6.
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Red Lentil soup 300 gr lentils, 1 liter of water, 1 liter vegetable broth, 2 spoons of tomato paste, 0,5 garlic cut in slices, 1 red (hot) chilipeper, 3 leaves of laurel, 1 small branche rosemary, 1 chopped onion, 0,5 dl olive oil, 2 spoons of wine vinager, 2 spoons of oregano or marjoram, salt and pepper et the lentils soak in water (average 2/3 hours, depending on what you bought). Add all ingredients to the lentils, except for the vinegar, oil and the freshly cut herbs.
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Put water in the pan until it covers 3/4 cm over the lentils and let it softly cook for 30 minutes. Stir now and then and add more broth if the soup gets too thick. Remove the chili, rosemary and laurel. Add the oil and vinegar and let it boil again. Remove from the fire and add oregano/marjoram, salt and pepper. Eat with good bread (spread with olive oil and garlic?). The doctor advises to drink a cold wine. I would buy - if possible - the lovely, fruity Chromitsa white wine. CorD / November 2008 77
LEISURE & LIFESTYLE
Timotije - Tima Simic, baker from Mosarin, who once baked bread for Josip Broz Tito, says that no one could eat his fill from this modern bread, all ‘pumped up’ with additives.
Our Daily Bread
Timotije presents his wares to Tito and members of his cabinet
Uncle Tima’s bread was eaten in Karadjordjevo by many statesmen of the world, sheikhs and their wives… Bread is the most often seen food item on the tables around the world.The story about bread is actually the story about life. BY ZORICA TODOROVIC MIRKOVIC
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he people have become picky – white bread, once a symbol of wealth and nobility, is all but banished from the table giving way to the ever more popular brown bread, corn bread, rye bread, soy bread or buckwheat bread. It’s that ‘healthy-way-of-life’ trend to which ‘health food’ fits as well, where there’s no room for white flour products, including the soft, fragrant white bread. The bakers marvel at this, but also the elderly, who remember well that only four to five decades ago white bread was for most families a dream which only came true around holidays.
78 CorD / November 2008
The story about bread is actually the story about life. We grew up on bread, it nurtured us. We swear by it (‘Leba mi’ – ‘By my bread’), we use it in curses (‘Lebac mu
se ogadio!’ – ‘May he get sick of bread!’), it is a rule to us (‘Ko tebe kamenom, ti njega hlebom’ – ‘If someone casts a stone at you, you cast bread at him’ (supposedly this saying in Serbian comes from the Bible, but I just couldn’t find it and so I’m not sure about the translation)), we migrate because of it (‘Trbuhom za kruhom’ – ‘Following the bread’ (a somewhat free translation for lack of a better alternative),
THE YEAST OF ‘DISSENT’
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he use of yeast was an ingenious, probably accidental, discovery in the long history of bread. Based on historical evidence, it is certain that the Mesopotamians and Egyptians knew about yeast, although a different kind compared to what we have today. When the miracle happened and yeast bread spread its fragrance from the oven, a new page was started in the bread-making textbook. It is believed that it was precisely yeast bread that was one of the three reasons which led to the disagreement and later division of the Christian church into catholic and orthodox. The former still uses unleavened bread as its communion bread, while the latter makes the symbol of life out of leavened dough.
Timotije pictured alongside CorD’s Zorica Todorović and when troubles and pressure get to us, we use it as our last resort by saying: ‘I’m not going to agree to that even if I have nothing to eat but dry bread!’. When someone is asking for too much, we say: ‘Trazis preko hleba pogace’ – ‘You’re asking for bread when you’ve got bread.’ Many generations were raised on slices of bread with lard on it, and if it is sprinkled with ground red paprika and with onion rings on it, you have a true feast. LITTLE LEPINJAS (round flat bread; I guess buns would be the closest thing to this, but still not quite the same) FOR TITO - But even bread isn’t what it used to be – says Timotije Tima Simic, baker from Mosorin, whose homemade Vojvodinian bread and lepinjas were a treat for Josip Broz Tito – I’m sure that the president wouldn’t even look at this modern bread, ‘pumped up’ with additives. Who in the world can eat his fill with this; everyone would go hungry. Tima is qualified to make such a claim since he was the personal baker to the president of former Yugoslavia in his residence in Karadjordjevo for eight full years. ‘Hot and fresh,’ he used to announce his specialties made of flour, and they were even sent to Brioni for the president. Tito, he remembers, liked it best when he made him ‘peasant bread,’ which weighs two to three kilos. -Tito would take it, all full and rosy, cut it in half, and each half of the bread would be tempting you to sink your teeth in it – Tima says – You don’t know if the crunchy crust is better or the middle. Tito would then put the bread against his stomach, slice it with a large baking knife and offer it to those there with him, handing everyone a nice big slice. Various world statesmen came to Karadjordjevo: sheikhs and their wives, emperors, kings, presidents of powerful
countries, smooth diplomats… The hunts, which were often organized in karadjordjevo, sometimes lasted up to twenty days and there was almost no guest who didn’t approach Tima’s oven at those times, drawn by the smell of bread and little lepinjas. -Tito liked to watch me bake – says Tima sifting through his memories – He would come, sit down by the brick oven and watch me knead the dough by hand. Boy did he like to make jokes, and I wasn’t
beginning, gaining various forms, tastes and smells, all the way to the finest pastry, it is definitely the most often seen food item on the tables around the world. In Serbia, for example, you can hardly imagine a table without bread. Around one hundred types of bread are made here and it also serves to welcome someone to the house – bread and salt were traditionally always brought to a guest. Many museums in the world dedicated
When you ask Timotije Tima Simic for his recipe, he just waves away with his hand: What recipe? I didn’t bake bread from notes. I add everything needed: flour, water, yeast… How much? How should I know, I just make a rough estimate… You have to feel the dough with your hand for the bread to be delicious and make you full.That’s the kind I kneaded and baked and that’s the kind Tito liked best far behind either. I knew that the guests, no matter how ‘high profile’ they were, could not resist my specialties. Many didn’t follow protocol (which said that they should only eat their own food, specially delivered), and this rule was broken the most by the Ceausescu couple.
WELCOMING BREAD Tima Simic stoked the fire by himself and cleaned and dusted the ovens by himself as well. Unfortunately, as he says, no one does this anymore and he claims that the industrial bread can never replace handmade one, neither can it replace the pleasure of seeing it come out of the oven plump and rosy with just its smell and beauty making your stomach full. Of course, there are rare individuals like uncle Tima who still bake homemade bread for themselves and for friends. Although bread has evolved since its
to this food item bear witness that bread is a wonder that follows man through life, but also in after death rites. The largest of these is in Ulm, Germany, where there’s a large library on the subject. There’s a bread museum in Serbia too, in Pecinci, a place 40km from Belgrade. The Serbian museum of bread is loyal to the tradition of customs connected with bread in our country. This shrine of a kind has three collections: a collection of tools to work the land, a collection of items used in bread making and a collection of breads. Here, breads are divided into groups: Christmas bread, Easter bread, Wedding bread, Slava bread. The museum also contains valuable documentation on Serbian ritual bread made while in mourning. Some day, Timotije Tima Simic, with his life story and baking experience, will certainly also go into the annals of this museum. Of course, it will be in honour of – bread. CorD / November 2008 79
CULTURE
Halloween - western Christian tradition
Fright Night A sudden chill in the air, the sickly haunting glow of the leering jack-o’-lantern; the spookiest night of the year is almost upon us. But how much do you really know about Halloween? Lock your windows and doors and turn out the lights as CorD takes you through some of the history behind this most ghoulish of traditions. BY RICHARD WORDSWORTH
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he word ‘Halloween’ itself is a condensed form of ‘All Hallows Even’ (‘even’ in this case being a shortened form of ‘evening’), the night directly preceding All Hallows Day, or All Saints Day as it is more commonly known. In western Christian tradition, All Saints Day is the day of commemoration for all past saints and martyrs, the church having grouped all the previous days of commemoration into one, as there had previously been too many. The Halloween celebration that we know today, however, is decidedly spookier. The modern celebration has its origins in ancient Celtic mythology, and the festival of Samhain. Samhain was the Celtic festival celebrating the end of the harvest, which took place on the 31st of October. Traditionally this was the day on which the Celts slaughtered their livestock and laid down stores of meat and crops for the winter, a process which marked the beginning of the Celtic New Year, and gave thanks to their Gods for what they had provided. However, the jubilant festivities were tainted by a sinister connection with the dead, and it the festival was viewed as a day for considering those who had passed away in the village, and for paying respects to the restless spirits of those who had recently died.
Bonfires Not to pay such respects had a high cost for the Celtic people. Samhain was also believed to be the night of the year where the boundaries between the world of the living and the 80 CorD / November 2008
The carved pumpkin is arguably the most recognisable icon of Halloween world of the dead became most blurred, and that evil and vengeful spirits from the underworld would come back to damage or spoil the food the people had harvested and leave them hungry in winter, or worse. To counteract this, the Celts built huge fires onto which they cast the bones of the slaughtered farm animals (thus providing us with the modern
word ‘bonfire’) in order to purify and protect themselves from harm. In order to further guard themselves against prowling demons, the Celts also wore the earliest instances of what we would recognise as Halloween costumes, blackening their faces with soot or fashioning grotesque masks in the belief that dressing as
BONFIRES
COSTUMES
LANTERNS
Evil and vengeful spirits from would come back to spoil the food the people had harvested and leave them hungry in winter, or worse.To protect themselves, the Celts built huge fires onto which they cast the bones of the slaughtered farm animals.
The Celts wore the earliest Halloween costumes; blackening their faces with soot or fashioning grotesque masks in the belief that dressing as monsters themselves would disguise them from the real demons that crossed over into their world
Turnips carved with human and demon faces were placed outside of homes to frighten off the evil spirits of the night whilst the home owners were at the local bonfires. Only when the tradition was exported to America by Irish were pumpkins first carved with faces
monsters themselves would disguise them from the real demons that crossed over into their world that night, or would at least placate them sufficiently to ensure they caused no mischief. Often, fruit, nuts and whatever else frightened villagers could spare were left out on paths or doorsteps in the hope that these would sate the demons’ hunger and dissuade them from attacking and devouring people instead.
Carved Pumpkins Arguably the most recognisable icon of Halloween, the tradition of carving monstrous faces in pumpkins is a European tradition that dates back hundreds of years. In Celtic tradition, the head was considered to be the most spiritually important part of the body, and protected the mind and the soul. Turnips carved with human and demon faces were placed outside of homes to frighten off the evil spirits of the night whilst the home owners were at the local bonfires. Only when the tradition was exported to America by Irish immigrants fleeing famine in Ireland in the 19th century were pumpkins first carved with faces, as pumpkins were more readily available than turnips and also easier to carve, due to their larger size.
Modern Halloween stems from ancient Celtic mythology The name “Jack-o’-Lantern” has its roots in the Irish Halloween folktale of Stingy Jack, also known as Jack the Smith. According to legend, Stingy Jack was an infamous drunkard, known all across Ireland as the lowest and most despicable person in the land. The devil, hearing these
rumours, was most interested to meet such a pariah, and came to meet him and take him back to hell where he belonged. Jack, however, despite his outrageous inebriation, managed to trick the devil by appeal-
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CULTURE
ing for one last apple before he was taken to hell. The devil obliged this last request and climbed a near by apple tree to fetch Jack an apple, at which point Jack surrounded the bottom of the tree with crucifixes, trapping the devil in the branches. Unable to climb down, the devil made a deal with Jack that he would spare his soul if he let him out of the tree, which Jack agreed to, and so the devil grudgingly climbed down and disappeared back to hell, leaving Jack with his soul intact. Jack eventually drunk and debauched his way to an early grave, and when he finally staggered up to the gates of heaven was quite understandably told by St. Peter that he wasn’t welcome. He was dismissed and sent to see the devil, who told him that because of their deal he couldn’t be allowed into the underworld either. However, the devil did give him an ember from the fires of hell inside a turnip (to which Jack was quite partial), before turning Jack away to wander the Earth for eternity with his turnip lantern.
Trick or Treat The idea of children wandering from house to house collecting sweets also predates the modern Halloween celebration, and the trick or treating that we recognise today has its roots in two traditions. In the middle ages, ‘souling’ was an annual passtime for the poor and the homeless, and involved begging for scraps of food from door to door at the end of October. However, the food they received
Trick-or-Treaters count their goodies after a night’s knocking
Wikipedia: “Celtic New Year”
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he carved pumpkin, lit by a candle inside, is one of Halloween’s most prominent symbols in America, and is commonly called a jack-o’-lantern. Originating in Europe, these lanterns were first carved from a turnip or rutabaga. Believing that the head was the most powerful part of the body containing the spirit and the knowledge, the Celts used the “head” of the vegetable to frighten off any superstitions. Halloween, or Hallowe’en, is a holiday celebrated on the night of October 31. Halloween activities include trick-or-treating, ghost tours, bonfires, costume parties, visiting “haunted houses”, carving Jack-o’-lanterns, reading scary stories and watching horror movies. Irish immigrants carried versions of the tradition to North America in the nineteenth century. Other western countries embraced the holiday in the late twentieth century. Halloween is celebrated in several countries of the Western world, most commonly in the United States, Canada, Ireland, Puerto Rico, Japan, New Zealand, United Kingdom and occasionally in parts of Australia. In Sweden the All Saints’ official holiday takes place on the first Saturday of November. Halloween has its origins in the ancient Celtic festival known as Samhain from the Old Irish samain). The festival of Samhain is a celebration of the end of the harvest season in Gaelic culture, and is sometimes regarded as the “Celtic New Year”. Traditionally, the festival was a time used by the ancient pagans to take stock of supplies and slaughter livestock for winter stores. The ancient Gaels believed that on October 31, now known as Halloween, the boundary between the alive and the deceased dissolved, and the dead become dangerous for the living by causing problems such as sickness or damaged crops. The festivals would frequently involve bonfires, into which bones of slaughtered livestock were thrown. Costumes and masks were also worn at the festivals in an attempt to mimic the evil spirits or placate them. 82 CorD / November 2008
from the home owners was no simple act of charity. In exchange for whatever food they received, they would then be expected to pray for the generous people of the houses and for their recently deceased loved ones on All Souls Day on November the 2nd, in the belief that many people praying for a person did more good than just one. At around the same period it was not uncommon for children in Scotland and Northern Britain to practice something called ‘guising’ (from the word ‘disguise’), a similar practice of going door to door for food, but with the added obligation on the children of having to perform for the owners of the household. Usually the performances would be something simple, like reciting poems or singing while in costume, and in return they could expect a gift of fruit or nuts for their troubles. The ‘tricks’ and pranks that the children would play if farmers and home owners refused them food went largely unpunished as Celtic superstitions that the mischief had been caused by fairies or restless spirits had yet to be shaken. Happy Halloween from CorD!
FROM THE WORLD PRESS
missed out on the peace prize then. But not this time.
MARTTI AHTISAARI GETS A DESERVED THE QUIET NOBEL PEACE RUSSIAN PRIZE FOR A ast week Serbia’s neighbours Montenegro (FAILED) PLAN and Macedonia recognised Kosovo, the
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fter a long career as a successful mediator, Martti Ahtisaari finally won the Nobel Peace Prize - for a mission that failed. To be sure, the amiable Finn richly deserved a Lifetime Achievement Oscar for his track record in international diplomacy, very much in the same spirit as the Nobel recognition of Jimmy Carter in 2002. Yesterday’s award, however, was seen widely as an attempt by the Nobel Committee to bolster his most recent enterprise: Kosovo’s peaceful but controversial transition to independence. The “Ahtisaari Plan” for Kosovo, which he drafted last year as a UN special envoy, has been roundly rejected by Russia and Serbia. Timing being everything, this year’s award comes as the international community tries to manoeuvre Moscow and Belgrade into accepting the inevitability of a free Kosovo. “Given that Ahtisaari had been in the frame for the prize before, it’s a very odd thing that it has happened now,” a European diplomat noted. “It’s fair to say the Nobel Committee wanted to boost the stability of the Balkans.” In this respect, the 2008 peace prize is similar to the 2007 award to the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change just before talks on global warming; or the prize to Mohammed El-Baradei and the International Atomic Energy Agency in 2005 as they grappled with Iran’s nuclear programme. The committee made the same gambit in 1988 when it conferred the peace prize on UN peacekeeping forces just as a large force of “blue berets” was preparing to usher Namibia to independence - part of the rapid resurgence of UN peacekeeping at the end of the Cold War. The Namibia operation turned out to be one of the UN’s great successes. Mr Ahtisaari 84 CorD / November 2008
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world’s newest country - leaving aside South Ossetia and Abkhazia, bringing the number of its official friends to 48. However, after expelling Macedonia’s ambassador in a huff, Serbia was soon all smiles as the United Nations General Assembly supported its request that the International Court of Justice (ICJ) rule on the legality of Kosovo’s independence - by an impressive vote of 77-6. The court’s opinion on Kosovo, which experts say could take one to three years, is not binding, but it will put a break on further efforts to integrating Kosovo into the world community as an independent country. The move was a much-needed victory for Serbia, which lobbied heavily during the build-up to the vote. Despite the fact that 90 per cent of Kosovars are nominally Muslim and despite the popular image of Serbia as anti-Muslim, Egypt, Algeria, Indonesia and Iran supported Serbia, showing that this is not a Muslim issue. Seventy-four nations abstained, including most European and Muslim nations, strange bedfellows, but understandably so. The Europeans don’t want to oppose a legitimate recourse to international law. Some European and most Muslim nations have separatist movements like Indonesia, which has to deal with ethnic conflicts in Aceh and Irian Jaya, and Azerbaijan, with its Armenian breakaway enclave NagornoKarabakh. Separatist concerns also lie behind the reluctance of some European Union countries to recognise Kosovo. Only 20 of the union’s 27 members have done so, with those opposed to the move including Spain, Cyprus and Romania. It was also a victory for Russia, which has been explaining to the Muslim world ever since Kosovo declared independence in February what a dangerous precedent it is. In mid-March, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said before beginning a Middle East visit that Moscow was urging
Muslim states to withstand pressure to recognise Kosovo, a state he said had been “illegally formed. I would like to warn against the temptation to give in to calls from nonArab and non-Islamic states addressed to Islamic countries to show Islamic solidarity and recognise Kosovo,” he told Rossiiskaya Gazeta. Lavrov also pointed to unrest taking place in Tibet at the time, suggesting that Kosovo’s breakaway had helped to trigger the “disorder” there. Only six members of the 57-state Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) have recognised its independence. The day after the independence declaration, OIC Secretary- General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu issued a statement declaring “our solidarity with and support to our brothers and sisters there. There is no doubt that the independence of Kosovo will be an asset to the Muslim world and will further enhance joint Islamic action.” But at an OIC summit in Dakar, Senegal, a month later, OIC heads of state resisted a Turkish initiative and merely voiced “solidarity”, leaving recognition up to individual member states. The only six to have taken the step so far are Turkey, Albania, Afghanistan, Burkino Faso, Sierra Leone and Senegal. “We strongly believe that the support we got from the international community to gain our freedom is the largest miracle of Allah and the largest sign of his mercy towards his people in Kosovo,” Blerim Gashi, public information officer of the Kosovar-Arab friendship and economic cooperation chamber, wrote on the Al-Arabiya television channel’s website. “We do hope that our brothers in faith will take their rightful place on our side.” It is the poorest country in Europe, notorious for drug, arms and human smuggling, and with an unemployment rate of 40 per cent. Kosovo authorities have no control over about 15 per cent of its territory where about 200,000 Serbs live. Local Serbs in those areas recognise only the Serbian government, despite opposition from Kosovo’s UN and European Union administrators. Arab nations see in Russia not only an important ally and counterweight to the US, but a role model of sorts. Political analyst Abdel-Fattah Mady at Alexandria University writes at IslamOnline.net, “Arab countries fail to define a framework for their common
national security. Unfortunately, Arab regimes cannot distinguish between their peoples’ interests and those of the United States. Russia teaches Arabs a very important lesson: Arabs must settle their internal divisions if they want to join the club of nations that defend their interests without fearing the US. Unfortunately, Arabs lack strong leadership with a clear vision of national security. Neither do they have the political determination to change facts on the ground.”
A BOSNIAN POWDER KEG
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e are sleepwalking into another Balkan crisis. The Almost exactly 13 years ago, American leadership brought an end to Bosnia’s three-and-a-half-year war through the Dayton peace agreement. Today the country is in real danger of collapse. As in 1995, resolve and transatlantic unity are needed if we are not to sleepwalk into another crisis. Bosnian Serb Prime Minister Milorad Dodik, once the darling of the international community (and especially Washington) for his opposition to the nationalist Serb Democratic party, has adopted that party’s agenda without being tainted by their genocidal baggage. His long-term policy seems clear: to place his Serb entity, Republika Srpska, in a position to secede if the opportunity arises. Exploiting the weaknesses in the country’s constitutional structure, the international community’s weariness and EU inability to stick by its conditionality, he has, in two years, reversed much of the real progress in Bosnia over the past 13, crucially weakened the institutions of the Bosnian state, and all but stopped the country’s evolution into a functioning (and EU-compatible) state. Dodik’s actions have been fuelled by Russian encouragement and petrodollars. In addition his rival, the senior president of all of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Haris Silajdzic, has stressed the need to abolish the two entities that make up Bosnia, to create one non-federal country. Dodik professes to respect Dayton and Silajdzic wishes to revise it, but both men are violating its basic principle: a federal system within a single state. This toxic interaction is at the heart of today’s Bosnian crisis. As a result, the suspicion and fear that began the war in 1992 has been reinvigorated. A destructive dynamic is accelerating, and Bosnian and Croat nationalism is on the rise. The recent local elections gave a fillip to nationalist parties. This tipping point is the result of a distracted international community. While the Bush administration largely turned its back on Bosnia, the EU became deeply engaged; EU membership has been the critical lever for pressing reforms in Bosnia since it was
made policy in 2003. But the EU did not develop a coherent strategy, and by proclaiming progress where it has not been achieved, the EU has weakened not only its own influence in the country, but also the Office of the High Representative (OHR) and the international military presence (the European Union Force, Eufor, which succeeded Nato) the drivers of progress in Bosnia since Dayton. The degeneration of the OHR’s influence coincided with the withdrawal of the US military and the hollowing-out of Eufor, which now has little in the way of operational capacity. Despite the danger signals, France and Spain apparently want to pull the plug on Eufor altogether before the end of the year, seemingly to prove the purely technical point that EU missions can end. Post-Irish referendum, the EU’s foreign policy will be, above all, a Balkan policy. Attention has recently focused on Kosovo. But Bosnia has always been the bigger and more dangerous challenge. The country’s decline can still be arrested, provided the EU wakes up, the new US administration gets engaged, and both renew their commitment to Bosnia’s survival as a state, by maintaining an effective troop presence and beginning the process of strengthening the international community’s approach long-term, including finding ways to untie Bosnia’s constitutional knot. It’s time to pay attention to Bosnia again, if we don’t want things to get very nasty quickly. By now, we should all know the price of that.
THE ICELAND SYNDROME
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magine this scenario: In a medium-size European country - call it Country X - the bank regulators hold an ordinary meeting. These being extraordinary times, the regulators discuss the health of various banks, including the country’s largest - call it Bank Y - which is owned by an even larger Italian financial group. Last spring, Bank Y, which is perfectly healthy, transferred a large sum to its now somewhat-less-healthy Italian parent; since this is nothing unusual, the regulators drop the subject and move on. The following day, the matter is reported in a marginal, far-right newspaper in somewhat different terms: “A billion dollars transferred to Italy! Country X’s hard-earned money going abroad!” Within hours, as if on cue, everyone starts selling shares in Bank Y, whose stock price plunges. So does the rest of Country X’s smallish stock market. So does Country X’s currency. Within a few more hours, Country X is calling for an international bailout, the IMF is on the phone and the government is wobbling. Except for that final sentence - there was no inter-
national bailout or call to the International Monetary Fund, and the government is fine - that is a brief description of something that happened last week to one of Poland’s largest banks. A real meeting, followed by an unsubstantiated rumor in a dodgy newspaper, and a bunch of nervous investors started selling. Shares in the bank collapsed by the largest margin in its history; for one ugly day, they dragged down the rest of the Polish stock market and currency as well. The case of Iceland, which in recent weeks has nationalized its three major banks, shut its stock exchange and halted trading in its currency, is by now well known. Less well known is the speed with which the Icelandic disease is spreading. Consider Hungary, once the destination of choice for investors who wanted an Eastern European head office with a 19thcentury facade and a pastry shop next door: The currency is in free fall and so is the stock market, flummoxing those previously wellfed investors. (One of them told a Hungarian financial Web site: “I haven’t got a clue as to when and how this would end, I’m just staring into empty space.”) Or Ukraine, whose central bank governor declared his banking system “normal and reliable” on Monday of last week. By Tuesday of last week, Ukraine had desperately requested “ systemic support” from the IMF. So far, most of these crises have been explained away: The banks of Iceland had debts larger than Iceland’s gross domestic product, Hungary’s finances were long mismanaged, and Ukraine, whose president just called for the third election in as many years, is badly governed. But the speed with which some of these defaults are happening, coupled with the paranoia inherent in the political culture of small countries, has led many to suspect political manipulation as well. To put it another way: If you wanted to destabilize a country, wouldn’t this be an excellent time to do it? If Country X’s stock market can crash after the publication of a single article in an obscure newspaper, think what might happen if someone conducted a systematic campaign against Country X. And if you can imagine this, so can others. All governments have enemies, internal and external, or at least are faced with elements that do not wish them well: the political opposition, the country next door, the former imperial power. For someone, there will always be the temptation to bring down the government, destabilize the country and thus create political chaos. Even when there hasn’t been political meddling, someone else will suspect that it has occurred, anyway. Here, then, is a prediction: Political instability will follow economic instability like night follows day. Iceland is not alone. Serbia, the Baltic states, Kazakhstan, Indonesia, South Korea and Argentina are all in financial trouble; so, too, are Russia and Brazil. CorD / November 2008 85
LIFESTYLE & LEISURE
Large mushroom exhibition in Belgrade
Truffles are not Profitable “It is harder to become a member of our association than a member of the Government in Serbia. We value expert knowledge and diligence, and our licence needs to be renewed every two years”, the President of the Association of Mushroom Growers of Serbia, Branislav Uzelac, says jokingly for CorD magazine. BY MILOVAN MILIČKOVIĆ
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n mid-October the Association put together the Eight Mushroom Exhibition, which took place in Belgrade’s Dom Sindikata. Between 200 and 300 types of home-grown mushrooms were exhibited at this event, and Uzelac says that this figure was even higher last year. “In the last few years, due to climate change, the plant’s texture is changing, so some exotic Mediterranean plants have begun to spring up here in Serbia. Another problem is the law which allows for the free exploitation of mushrooms, with the only two kinds that are protected being the Caesar’s Mushroom and Morel, which are almost extinct.” The mushroom exhibition was assisted by the City Institute for Nature Protection, and this event enjoys the support of the city authorities year after year. Uzelac says that this is the biggest exhibition of its kind in the Balkans, and that exhibits like mushrooms on moss can rarely be seen anywhere else but here. One of the most interesting exhibits is the Death Cap, the most toxic mushroom to be found in Serbia, believed to be responsible for the vast majority of fatal mushroom poisonings. In addition to the Death Cap, there are a few other interesting mushrooms, while the visitors have always been drawn to the range of truffles, the most expensive mushroom in the world. Uzelac
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Black truffles are considered a delicacy and are the most expensive says that our soil is suitable for growing truffles, but not in quantities that can be used for commercial purposes. “In Istria, for example, close to 30 tons of truffles are produced each year, while in Serbia that quan-
tity amounts to around 50 kilograms. I saw some newspaper ads which advertise selling truffles, but I would not advise anybody to buy them since nobody knows where they originate from”, Uzelac says.
In a good season, the most expensive truffles reach the price of €200 per kilogram, while in bad season, the price can go up to €2,000. “I think that growing truffles is not as profitable as everybody says. If somebody in Serbia wants to grow mushrooms, I would recommend a less expensive option, and that is to grow button mushrooms, oyster mushrooms or Shiitake”, Uzelac advises. The mushroom exhibition in Belgrade’s Dom Sindikata has become a traditional event and is a good opportunity for visitors to examine edible and toxic mushrooms. A truffle is the valuable and highly sought-after, edible fruiting body of a group of subterranean fungi. The ascoma (fruiting body) of truffles is highly prized as a food, their smell has been described as similar to deep-fried sunflower seeds or walnuts, although it has also been described as “a foul aroma.”Not all people are able to smell the odour of this fungus. People have noted that
Masses gather to check out the exhibition at Belgrade’s Dom Sindikata
water in which truffles have been soaked in can taste similar to soy sauce. BrillatSavarin called the truffle “the diamond of the kitchen” and praised its aphrodisiacal powers. While their aphrodisiac properties have not been proven as yet, truffles are nevertheless held in high esteem in French, northern Italian and Istrian cooking, as well as in international haute cuisine. Today, we know for sure that mushrooms have been a food to humans for over 2,000 years. There is written and material evidence from ancient times to support that, particularly from South America and China. At
the same time, history tells us stories about mushroom poisonings and tragedies that ensued. Unfortunately, today, we also have to deal with unpleasant and even horrific consequences of an unguarded consumption of self-grown mushrooms. Edible mushrooms are certainly the food of the future! They contain very few calories, and are rich in vitamins, proteins and raw fibre. They also contain no useless ingredients and are very beneficial for people who are not very physically active. The key thing, however, is to know what, when, in which way and how often should we consume them. Some genera are toxic. The term ‘toxic’ has different meaning in various circumstances. Toxic mushrooms can serve as standard food for snails! The reason for this is a completely different physiology and anatomy of these two species. Toxins that attack blood, liver and kidneys have no effect on snails because these animals don’t have such tissues or organs! Also, some edible mushrooms contain dangerous toxins, but in such small dosages that we could poison ourselves only if we ate several hundred kilograms during one
SUPERFOOD
POISONING
SYMPTOMS
Edible mushrooms are certainly the food of the future! They contain very few calories, and are rich in vitamins, proteins and raw fibre. They also contain no useless ingredients and are very beneficial for people who are not very physically active.
Contrary to an unwritten toxicology rule, when you are poisoned with mushrooms, the longer the time between eating a mushroom and feeling the first symptoms, the graver the danger for the person concerned.
The symptoms of mushroom poisoning are initially very similar to those of food poisoning. Since the symptoms of mushroom poisoning fade out after 24 hours, many people don’t seek medical help, but this is very dangerous.
sitting. Hence, the mushrooms that we consider toxic are those that contain such concentration of toxins such as to cause negative symptoms after consumption of only a few hundred grams. It is a well-known fact that there are quite a few ingredients in mushrooms that are dangerous for human body. Contrary to an unwritten toxicology rule, when you are poisoned with mushrooms, the longer the time between eating a mushroom and feeling the first symptoms, the graver the danger for the person concerned. It is a good thing to be scared of toxic mushrooms, since fear leads to caution which can save your life. The most dangerous toxins to be wary of are those extracted from the Amanita species, which include the extremely poisonous Death Cap. Even the smallest of quantities of their toxins can have a fatal result. In terms of chemical composition, they are similar to proteins found naturally in humans. These toxins destroy the body’s ability to produce real proteins in human cells. Since these proteins are essential to the life of any human being, their destruction causes a terrible array of symptoms for the patient. The symptoms of mushroom poisoning are initially very similar to those of food poisoning: strong abdominal pain, vomiting and terrible diarrhoea. Since the symptoms of mushroom poisoning fade out after 24 hours, many people don’t seek medical help, thinking that they are getting better, but this is very dangerous. Usually, three days after eating a toxic mushroom, there is a frightening turn of events – the liver starts to fail (necrosis, or the death of tissue, develops), there is even more severe diarrhoea, cramps, delirium, kidney failure, followed by a coma and then, often, death. CorD / November 2008 87
LIFESTYLE & LEISURE
Restaurant Review – Iguana on the Corner
Fusion Cuisine at its Best We’ve known Iguana for some time. It came recommended as an original and funky eatery with minimalist flare and a carefully designed menu. If you still don’t know, Iguana has moved from its old address to a new one. Actually it’s moved into a whole other restaurant, Na Ćošku (At the Corner), to make Iguana na Ćošku, situated literally on the corner of Beogradska and Krunska Street. BY JELENA MICKIĆ PHOTO ČASLAV VUKOJIČIĆ
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he restaurant is very recognizable with big green bay windows overlooking the street life. When entering the door, you walk straight into the restaurant. There is no big impersonal lobby or a long meandering corridor. Iguana na Ćošku is not that kind of place. It’s a charming restaurant with an excellent food, as I’m going to tell you. As you walk straight in there is a small bar on your right hand side, where if you like you can have your aperitif before you get seated. Iguana na Ćošku is not a big place. It’s rather intimate and serene. This could be due to its clientele, food, atmosphere or all three together. The interior is a cross between the old Na Ćošku, which used to be a more traditional restaurant, and funky Iguana. Now the main eating room is transformed into a cosy, soft minimalist’s lounge where a chalkboard announcing the soup of the day hangs on a creamy beige wall. The tables are close to each other, but it does
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not seem to bother the guests who enjoy the on I’d have enjoyed either tuna steak in caPrices: food and informal but refined atmosphere. per sauce or steamed sole fillet with veggies Apricot Brandy 120 din If you’re a nature person and like to people and rice noodles. Martini Bianco 120 din watch ask for one of the tables next to the My companion’s steak had a very difShrimp salad with avocado, cherry big bay windows. Just know that you’ll be ferent flare. Its slices were topped with rich tomato and rocket 650 din spotted too. foie gras sauce and served with grilled vegGrilled salmon with sweet chili and There is a salon at the back of the resetables and basmati rice. You can ask for coconut milk sauce 880 din taurant which is good for bigger parties. French fries, but grilled vegetables and rice Steak “Café de Paris” 880 din Decorated in rustic and more robust dark are much healthier option. The dish was Sticky date pudding 2x250 din furniture pieces it is a reminiscence of the nicely prepared, well seasoned, with just a Knjaz Milos Carbonated 0.75L 120 original Na Ćošku décor . right taste of smooth and subtle foie gras bitdin Carefully chosen background music is a terness. It came as a perfect autumnal dish. jazzy fusion that discretely compliments the If you like stronger flavours you might enTotal: 3,270 din. food. Such is the atmosphere and the clienjoy steak with green peppercorn sauce or tele is a mix of international business peoveal cutlet with chestnut and honey sauce. Iguana na Cošku ple and local sophisticated younger profesAs the evening was closing to the end, Beogradska 37 sionals. we couldn’t resist indulging ourselves with Phone: 011 3236 470, 3246 161 We started our diner with aperitif, Martini Iguana’s signature dessert; sticky date pudBianco for me and an excellent ding. You may consider shardomestic apricot brandy for my ing it, as the serving is very companion. While sipping our generous. drinks we were served with It comes topped with a warm sliced whole grain bread and olsauce of cream, butter and ive oil and balsamic vinegar dip brown sugar. Yes, it’s creamy, - zesty and appetizing. velvety, sweet and rich, but if The Iguana at the Corner you were good like me, and had menu is short but nicely balfish for the main course, you anced list of dishes to satismay have this treat. Other desfy the taste for light and fusion serts include: chocolate soufflé, cuisine. You can recognize East cheesecake, green apple sorbet, Asian influences, lightly transšnenokle (or floating islands, a formed just to tickle European Serbian desert). taste buds. For those with a soft Iguana na Ćošku has a long spot for gourmet food, there are list of regional red and white mode traditional dishes like filwines with a selection from let mignon, turkey served with pasta tatters, or steaks. Italy, France and the New World. If you would like a glass of a For starter we decided to share a shrimp salad with cherry toma- dessert wine you can chose from Port, Bermet, Marsala or Pastis. to and avocado slices on a bed of rocket. It was yummy. I liked the This is a relaxed and unpretentious restaurant with an excellent way the salad was seasoned, but if you’re watching your salt intake selection of food. It’s a place where you can drop in for something be sure to let the waiter know. less than a full meal, whether it is a bowl of pumpkin soup, prawn When choosing the main course we relied on the waiter’s rec- and truffle chowder or brunch on a lazy Sunday. The service is proommendation. I like light and sea food, while my companion pre- fessional, helpful and attentive. fers richer tastes. I went for grilled salmon with sweet chilli and coThe restaurant is popular so make sure you reserve in advance. conut milk sauce on blanched spinach and my companion opted for Parking can be a problem, as you have to park in busy neighboursteak “Cafe de Paris”. ing streets and that can take some time. My pink salmon fillet was buttery tender and the sauce not onIf you like the food Iguana na Ćošku offers, you might like to ly took out the unpleasant fishiness, but its creamy and soft tex- know they do catering too, a fusion combo of Italian and Asian ture gave a new dimension to the fish. If I hadn’t chosen salmcuisines. CorD / November 2008 89
TECHNO TALK
Lego Mindstorms NXT Price: EUR 220.00 After what seems like a lifetime of anticipation, Lego has finally launched its Mindstorms NXT robot kit – and once again it’s hit the mark. The core of the system is the ‘intelligent brick’: basically a small computer with inputs for the touch, sound, light and ultrasonic sensors, and outputs for the three servo motors. The Mindstorms software, compatible with both PC and Mac, has 18 building and programming challenges, ranging in difficulty from a simple three-wheeled driving robot up to a full bipedal robot. Lego’s claim that you’ll have your first robot in action after 30 minutes is entirely accurate, even though all it will do is drive, turn around and return to its starting position – to hoots of derision from any spectators. The motors, for example, are accurate to one degree of rotation. Programs are downloaded to the brain by USB or Bluetooth.
ZMP Nuvo Price: EUR 4,800.00 Nuvo does some clever things but nothing to warrant his near vertical price tag. If, however, you reprogram Robosapiens in your spare time, this little guy might have some limited appeal. Pros: Neat back flips pleasing on the eye. Better than an imaginary friend but you’ll still have to use your imagination to fully enjoy his companionship. Cons: Paltry two hour battery life. Not very energetic or exciting. Like a phoenix rising from Aibo’s flames, Nuvo has taken on the mantle of ‘cleverest consumer robot’ but in humanoid form, as opposed to Sony’s Scrappy-Doo canine design. With an eye-watering price, does Nuvo do enough to impress? We’re far from the age of truly useful household robots but we do expect some cleverness for our money… At the heart of any good robot is an array of sensors. Nuvo has an obstacle sensor to stop him running into things, various sensors to help him stay upright and a microphone so he can hear voice commands such as ‘Nuvo, go forward’. The voice recognition isn’t too bad but there’s a remote control if he’s having hearing problems. With a walking speed of three metres per minute, Nuvo is pretty nippy. He’s the hare to Aibo’s tortoise, although it’s slow and steady that wins the race because, while Aibo is comfortable on most surfaces, Nuvo needs hard floor or he’ll fall over. The irony is that you’ll be more worried about him on the hard stuff, as a fall would chip that paintwork something chronic. If he just sits around doing nothing, you can squeeze almost two hours from his rechargeable battery. With active use, getting him to walk around, take photos and perform tricks, you’ll be lucky to get an hour. Unlike Sony’s Aibo, he doesn’t have a charging station to go back to, either. 90 CorD / November 2008
Nikko R2-D2 Price: EUR 2,570.00 The stuff of Star Wars legend - not only a great gadget for collectors, but a decent projector and iPod speaker dock, too. From a galaxy far, far away, comes the mother of all iPod docks. We’re talking a 2ft tall remote-control R2-D2 robot that can project movies from your iPod onto a wall. Yes, it really exists – and it’s called the Nikko R2-D2 Home Entertainment system. As well as projecting movies through its lens, the Nikko has a built-in CD and DVD player, FM radio, 20w stereo speakers and an enormous control pad shaped like the Millennium Falcon, which pops out from underneath. Manoeuvre the little fella into place and - holy Jabba! - it beams out an 80in picture.
Meccano Spyke Price: EUR 257.00 Packed with features, works like a dream and can take pictures of your cat from the other side of the world. What more do you want? Dimensions: 350x200x200mm Weight:3kg Johnny 5 is alive! Although he’s shrunk considerably, and gained some new security features. The point? You can guide him around your house from the other side of the world, using his webcam to check you haven’t been the victim of a Skins-style MySpace rave. If you have, then we suggest you use the VoIP phone to relay a polite message to them. He comes in pieces, but snaps together in a few minutes - unlike his Lego robo-rival. On board is a digital music player but don’t expect audiophile-quality playback. The software is a joy to use, and completely idiot-proof.
Ugobe Pleo Price: EUR 270.00 Little Pleo has stolen Stuff’s heart and helped heal the wounds inflicted by the departure of AIBO. He’s so life-like, it seems insulting to call him a robot. Wi-Fi:No. Battery life: 2 hours Memory card type: SD. You look after Pleo from his birth and guide him through his juvenile years. It’s a bit like having a puppy, but luckily there’s no sick or robopoop to clean up. Once charged, Pleo spends the first few hours crying, learning how to walk and checking out his new surroundings. As he grows, he develops a personality and an impressive selection of movements that puts the likes of Homosapien and Robonova to shame.
Flytech Dragonfly Price: EUR 38.00 The Dragonfly is a brilliant and unique toy – challenging to fly but more rewarding than most mini choppers. Brought to you by the people behind Robosapien, the Dragonfly has four flapping wings (two up, two down), which mimic the action of a real dragonfly, allowing it to hover and soar with such agility. Launch it into the air like a paper aeroplane, open the throttles on the remote and the super-light polystyrene beastie flaps up and away. Designed for indoors, it’s tough enough to withstand being repeatedly flown into the patio doors although if you land it on the tongue of a yawning rottweiler, it’s game over.
Scalextric Triple Rivals Price: EUR 257.00 Here at Stuff we love nothing more than the smell of petrol stinging our nostrils, the roar of engines causing premature deafness, all those gorgeous grid girls that hang out with the drivers at each Grand Prix. Yes, we were born to race. Unfortunately, we’ve spent far too long playing Project Gotham Racing 3 and eating Jaffa Cakes to fit into one of those tiny sets of overalls that F1 drivers wear. Robonova Robonova Price: EUR 925.00 He’s not as clever as Nuvo or as affordable as Robosapien, but Robonova wins the battle of the robots with an irresistible mix of agility and charm. Can’t make you a cup of tea. Everyone secretly wants to own a dancing monkey, but boring old practicality makes it an impossible dream. The 32-button remote looks like it’s come straight from the box of a cheap Korean DVD player, and there are no instructions for what each button does. This makes for an interesting journey of discovery.
Jamungo Buds Series 2 Price: EUR 32.00 We’ve seen impressive Gorillaz, Master Chief and Superman collectables this year – but these new Jamungo Buds are top of the pile. Ever since the Garbage Pail Kids reigned down their iconic form of hate in trading card form back in the 80s, we’ve had something of a penchant for action figures with an edge. And here to sate our thirst for twisted toys is the second series of Jamungo Blow Up Dolls. CorD / November 2008 91
TECHNO TALK
Amazon Kindle Price: EUR 280.00 Amazon is trying to do to books what Apple did to music. Apple had computers, then made a store. Amazon has a store, and has made a computer. In a nutshell, the Kindle is a compact, electronic book with instant wireless access to 115,000 books sold by Amazon, an audiobook player, and a wireless Web browser. Kindle uses a cellular data network to deliver books, newspapers, magazines and weblogs to you immediately. This network, which Amazon calls “Whispernet”. Bookeen Cybook Gen3 Price: EUR 350.00 The Cybook is an portable reading device based on E Ink® Corporation’s low power electronic display technology. The Cybook features a 6” black and white screen with paper-like contrast making it reliable in most lighting conditions. With a small footprint, 8,000 page flips on a single charge of its Li-Polymer battery, HTML, PalmDOC and PDF support, this device seems great for personal use but I suspect perfect for schools and other educational settings. Size: 118 x 188 x 8.5 mm . Weight: 174 g (battery included) . Screen: 6” E Ink® screen (600x800 pixels, 166 dpi B&W, 4 grayscale), No backlight, Portrait and landscape mode . 92 CorD / November 2008
Sony PRS-505 Reader Price: EUR 257.00 Outclassed by paper books, but the best of the ebook reader bunch. If only the ebooks themselves were cheaper. Dimensions: 175x122x7.6mm, Weight: 260g. Memory card type: Memory Stick Duo, SD. Thanks to the Sony Reader, 2008 may well be remembered as the year of the ebook reader. Like its rivals, Sony’s second-gen device has a special ‘E Ink’ screen designed for reading text, something that LCD screens are not very suitable for. The screen itself is stunning. The way the text appears on screen is surreal – it looks like it has been printed on. Consequently, you can turn the Reader all around without the screen losing legibility, and it can be read in bright sunlight. On the down side, it is slow to refresh when you ‘turn’ pages, and that lack of backlight means you’ll need artificial light to read under the covers. But at least the number of digital books is growing at a healthy rate.
iRex iLiad Price: EUR 580.00 The Iliad is the best book reader we’ve come across, and soon had us forgetting we were looking at a screen. But we’re not quite ready to dump our paperbacks for it. Books: the last bastion of old-world technology or the first salvo in a centuries-long technological journey to the present? After all, before Gutenberg came along with his high-tech printing press, books were ‘illuminated’ by monks with bad eyesight. But the Iliad soon had us forgetting that we were looking at a screen rather than turning pages. It’s close to A5-sized, but incredibly thin and light, and the 1024x768 screen that takes up most of the front offers 16 shades of grey.
Dyson DC22 Baby Price: EUR 310.00 The Baby is the best Dual Cyclone Dyson yet and tougher than Mike Tyson in chainmail. Not many attachments in the box. Dyson revolutionised the vacuum cleaner industry with its bagless ‘cyclone’ dust busters.
Philips HD4686 Energy Saver Price: EUR 64.00 A kettle for the 21st century that saves energy and makes a better brew to boot Any barista will tell you that scorching your beans is a sure way to ruin a cup of gourmet coffee. Likewise, a fine green tea is best brewed at 80 degrees, so why do kettles always boil? Philips is the first manufacturer to properly address this rather obvious point, by letting you choose what temperature to heat your water to. It’ll save you a considerable amount of electricity in the long run too. In fact, there’s lots to love about this cordless kettle besides the unique temperature set button that lets you choose between 40 and 100 degrees.
LG Steam Direct Drive Price: EUR 1,028.00 Requires hot and cold plumbing Washing machines rarely pique our interest, but LG has put the laundry industry in something of a spin (sorry) with its revolutionary Steam Direct Drive machines. The use of steam is a stroke of genius that not only cleans your kit faster and more efficiently, but also promises to de-crease your shirts and free you from the curse of ironing forever. The ‘direct drive’ system is a more obvious innovation that turns the drum directly, doing away with the old belt and braces method that’s guaranteed to have your washer throwing itself around the kitchen as soon as your belt begins to wear out. This machine, by contrast, runs so discretely we were initially convinced it wasn’t working. In fact, she runs like a racehorse at 1,400rpm and you can load her up with a king size duvet and still have room for the sheets thanks to its cavernous 9kg drum. CorD / November 2008 93
HOW TO...
…Get food delivered day and night? Fancy some take-away food, but not sure where and what you can get? Check out the website www.donesi.com. This innovative site, available in both English and Serbian, lists restaurants by type of cuisine and provides details of the menu on offer, including prices, location, delivery zone and working hours.
CROSSWORD
Solve this crossword puzzle and test your Serbian – the clues may be in English, but the answers should be entered in Serbian
…Go skating? If you find your desire for skating frustrated by the salt and grit laying on Belgrade streets this winter, why not visit one of Belgrade’s skating rinks and enjoy warming refreshments while you skate the day away? Belgrade’s Olympic-sized skating rink at ‘Hala Pionir’ is open to the public year-round, and also stages ice hockey events and figure skating competitions. During the winter months, the fresh air skating experience is provided at the romantic setting of Kalimegdan fortress. Situated beside the basketball and tennis courts, Kalimegdan’s skating rink is open throughout the winter months and offers skating to music, as well as a snack bar.
…Visit the Royal residence? Ever wondered how the royals live? Now you can see for yourself. His Royal Highness Crown Prince Aleksander Karadjordjevic and family welcome visitors to Belgrade’s Royal Palace for tours and to view the artistic treasures of the residence. Those wishing to visit need merely contact the Palace Information and Press Department on 011 3064 000. Find out more information at www.royalfamily.org.
…Hire a limousine? Luxury transportation is available from Limousine Service. With their luxurious, stylish and glamorous vehicles, Limousine Service will ensure an unforgettable ride for those choosing to hire one of their cars. Make reservations by email, fax or phone. First-time riders should visit the centre in person with valid ID. Subsequent trips can be booked 48-hours in advance over the phone or via email. Contact Limousine Service on 063 1235555 or visit them online at www.limoservis.co.yu.
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…Get emergency car repairs or roadside assistance?
…Find an English-speaking dentist? Sick of being unable to explain just how much your tooth hurts to your Serbian dentist? Why not try out the services of dentist Katarina Gačić, a fluent English speaker. Contact Katarina on 064 3390527 or via email on katarina_gacic@hotmail.com.
…Make yourself understood? Find yourself frustrated by your inability to say simple things in Serbian? Here at CorD we are endeavouring to make your stay in the region a tad less alien by providing a few simple phrases that will help you make yourself understood: Is this your responsibility? Da li je ovo vaša odgovornost? Where was this manufactured? Gde je ovo proizvedeno? Is there a hotel in this town? Da li postoji hotel u ovom gradu? I would like to buy some milk and cheese? Želeo bih da kupim mleko i sir? When does the train to Zagreb depart? Kada polazi voz za Zagreb? Serbia has great nightlife, if you know where to look Srbija ima dobar noćni provod, ako znate gde da ga potražite 98 CorD / November 2008
HORIZONTALLY: 1. Transportation, 2. Type of projectile – A measure of land, 3. First name of Italian writer Calvino – Assistance and Information Services (abbrev.), 4. Oak bark – Island in the Adriatic Sea (Maun) , 5. Long period of time – Anchor (plural), 6. Chemical symbol for Silicon – adverb near, 7. Symbol for energy - Pumpkin, gourd – Chemical symbol for Sulphur, 8. Person who collects medicinal herbs – Chemical symbol for Astatine, 9. This day – a river in Ethiopia, 10. A mineral named after Eve – Mistake, misconception (latin), 11. A period stretching over one hundred years – Italian town on the Adriatic coast, 12. First name of American actress Archer – Confluent of the Kolubara River near Valjevo, 13. Lively game from Naples. VERTICALLY: 1. Two digit number, 2. Farmers – a town in Italy, 3. Jordan harbour on the Red Sea – Type of sea breeze, blows only during the day – Chemical symbol for Radium, 4. First name of actress Mihajlović – Pasture on a high mountain – Chemical symbol for Gallium, 6. Three digit number – a town in Spain – Spike, 6. Sign for Pančevo on a car number plate – American writer, Arthur – Former German ice skater, Christina, 7. Chemical symbol for Oxygen – Embroidered vest made of rural material (Turkish) – Sea fish, gilthead bream, 8. Military report – type of explosive, 9. A group of thirteen men. ANSWERS: Transport, raketa –ar, italo – spi , daba – maon, era – sidra, si – salate, e – dulek- s, travar – at , danas – omo, evit – eror, vek- trani, en – gradac, tarantela.
If your car breaks down while you are driving in the city, or even in the countryside, you are best advised to contact the ’International Touring and Information Centre of the Automobile Association of Serbia & Montenegro’. If you happen to be a member of this organisation, or similar affiliated foreign organisations, you can receive special terms. All relevant information can be obtained 24-hours-a-day by calling 9800 or 24 19 555, or via the website at www.amsj.co.yu.
Author: Branko Polić
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