Vucic and patriarch on Montenegro: This wasn't happening even during Ottoman Empire and communism

"Someone is trying to create a new church in Montenegro with only one reason, and that is that to ensure the Serb people will disappear in the next 10 years," said Vucic

President of Serbia Aleksandar Vucic met today in Belgrade with the Serbian Patriarch Irinej in the building of the General Secretariat of the President of the Republic.

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One of the main topics was the situation of the Serbian Orthodox Church (SPC) and the position of the Serb people in Montenegro.

After the meeting, the patriarch and the president have statements to the media:

Address by President Vucic

He said that it is especially interesting that politics interferes in church organization and spiritual matters, and that as this is not being done in Serbia, he expects that something like that should not be done in Montenegro, either.

"Someone is trying to create a new church in Montenegro with only one reason, and that is that to ensure the Serb people will disappear in the next 10 years," said Vucic.

He said that he would not allow the tearing of the national fabric of the Serb people, just because someone thought that Serbs could be assimilated, and that he hoped the patriarch was wrong when he said that expulsion of Serbs was a possibility.

"We will stand with our people, and there will be no new 'Storms' (like in Croatia in 1995) or persecution of the Serb population," Vucic stressed and said that Serbia and Montenegro must be close states.

"We Serbs seek only one thing, to be at home in our own homes. No one has the right to endanger the identity of the Serb people," he pointed out and said that a decision was made to help Serb organizations in Montenegro, all except political ones, in order to preserve the identity of the Serb people.

Address by Patriarch Irinej

"What is happening in Montenegro wasn't happening even during the Ottoman Empire, not even during communism, who had much more respect for the Serbian Orthodox Church and the Serb people. The goal is to apply the method that the Ustashas once used in Croatia, to expel the Serb people, and we know how and in what way," the patriarch stated.

As he said, he wonders whether Montenegrin President Djukanovic is thinking about his own people and the situation he has created.

"A new nation is being created, the Montenegrin one, which should displace everything that is called Serb. There are a lot of people from the Church who sponsor this condition. I appeal on Djukanovic to think carefully about what he is doing. It is strange that a man who has not been baptized, who is an atheist, wants to create a church. That never happened in the history of Christianity," Patriarch Irinej stressed.

(Telegraf.rs)