Public History –concepts and empirical research

The Embassy Of Austria

The Austrian Cultural Forum, the Embassy of Austria, and the Institute for Political Studies organized a lecture and discussion on “Public History – concepts and empirical research” in Belgrade. The participants of the lectures and discussions held at the Embassy of Austria were guest lecturers from the University of Vienna. Dr. Marko Demantovski spoke on the topic entitled: “Conceptualization of public history – theory, systematics, and practical consequences”, as well as Dr. Barbara Pavlek Lobl spoke on the topic “Empirical research of public history: Places of memory in Austria”. The moderator was Dr. Aleksandra Kolaković from the Belgrade Institute for Political Studies.

Opening of the exhibition

“Warsaw – Mariupol –cities of Ruins, cities of Struggle, cities of Hope”

The exhibition “Warsaw – Mariupol – cities of Ruins, cities of Struggle, cities of Hope” was opened in the KROKODIL Center. During the evening, Tetjana Pyankova and Marina Mihajlyuk, residents of KROKODIL’s residency program for literary creators from Ukraine, presented themselves. On this occasion, the documentary film “Erase the Nation” was shown, which shows the destruction of Ukrainian cultural heritage by the Russian army after the beginning of the aggression. The exhibition presents photographs of cities destroyed by two totalitarianism: Warsaw – razed to the ground in 1944, and Mariupol – destroyed in 2022 due to Russian aggression. This international exhibition shows the cruelty of war, which – regardless of the distance in time – is connected by the tragedy of civilians and soldiers, looting, and the destruction of infrastructure. Its goal, among other things, is to show the universal need for freedom that the Warsaw insurgents fought for and that Ukrainians are now fighting for. The exhibition “Warsaw – Mariupol – cities of Ruins, cities of Struggle, cities of Hope” was created at the initiative of the Vice President of the Sejm of the Republic of Poland Malgorzata Gosiewska and the President of the Supreme Council of Ukraine Ruslan Stefanchuk. The co-organizers of the project are Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of National Defense Mariusz Blaščak and the head of the Office for War Veterans and Victims of Repression, Jan Juzef Kaspšik. The installation consists of sixteen consecutive views of war-torn Warsaw and Mariupol, or places near Kyiv, destroyed during the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

This Saturday, I will convene a high-level meeting of the Belgrade-Pristina Dialogue. This time is different from previous meetings not just because I will meet President of Serbia Aleksandar Vučić and Prime Minister of Kosovo Albin Kurti in the region, in Ohrid, North Macedonia, instead of in the familiar halls of the European External Action Service in Brussels. But also because we will focus our discussion on the Implementation Annex of the recent EU Agreement that will result in the far-reaching normalisation of relations between Kosovo and Serbia. Both together will, in essence, result in the normalisation of life of people in the region and open Kosovo’s and Serbia’s respective paths towards joining the EU.

The Western Balkans are different from any other region in the EU’s immediate neighbourhood. This is what I realised even before becoming the EU’s High Representative/Vice-President in December 2019. One of the steps before becoming the EU’s head of foreign policy is a hearing in the European Parliament. During my exchange with the Parliament, special attention was paid to this region surrounded by the EU, and in particular my plans and ideas on the Dialogue on normalisation of relations, which at that point, the EU has been facilitating for almost 10 years. I committed myself on this occasion to conduct my first bilateral vis-