Officials of Novi Sad and Vojvodina as well as ambassadors of Israel and Hungary were not allowed to approach the plateau at the Dock of Victims during yesterday’s commemoration to the victims of Hungarian fascists in 1942 by the security of the Backa Eparchy of the Serbian Orthodox Church (SPC). The plateau was reserved for representatives of the SPC, the Chief Rabbi and representatives of the Jewish Community.

The Novi Sad Mayor Igor Pavlicic came to the commemoration together with the ambassadors of Israel and Efraim Zuroff, Director of the ‘Simon Wiesenthal’ Center. They, too were stopped at the entrance to the plateau. However, at one moment as ‘Blic’ journalist saw, one of the priests approached Pavlicic and invited him and the ambassador to step onto the plateau.

However, the security at the very entrance allowed only Zuroff to pass. He was also the only non-cleric allowed to address the people that gathered.

‘I came to the commemoration to pay my respect to the victims. I share the opinion of the Israeli Ambassador Josef Levy who said that this day should be a memory and solidarity by the Serbian, Jewish and Roma people and I do not want to comment on behavior by the Backa Eparchy’, Pavlicic told ‘Blic’.

At the Backa Eparchy they claim that ‘only Pavlicic and Jovanovic were not allowed on the plateau’ and that the ambassadors remained outside because of them’.

‘Pavlicic and Jovanovic were not in the official protocol. They wanted to use Efraim Zuroff and the ambassadors as the ‘Trojan horses’ in order to enter the plateau. We had to prevent them pass by force’, priest Vladan Simic, Secretary of the Backa Eparchy says for ‘Blic’.

According to his words the ambassadors of Israel and Hungary were in the official protocol but ‘the Pavlicic’s people surrounded them on purpose so that they could not approach the plateau’.

‘I personally asked Pavlicic to step aside so as to approach Mr. Zuroff and invite him on the plateau. Unfortunately I could not approach the ambassador’, Simic said. He claims that the city authorities ‘attempted to cause an incident on purpose’.

This incident is just a culmination of over many years poor relations between the Backa Eparchy and the City of Novi Sad authorities caused by conflict as to who has the right to organize the commemoration.

The commemoration service for more than 2000 killed citizens of Novi Sad was yesterday held by the Main Rabbi Isaac Asiel and the Serbian Patriarch Irinej.

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