LAZIĆ: PRISTINA IS ATTEMPTING TO CARRY OUT A CULTUROCIDE AGAINST SERBS

BELGRADE, JULY 31 /SRNA/ - Theologian Nebojša Lazić assessed that the announcement by the Pristina authorities regarding the introduction of "licensed tourist guides" who would supervise tourist guides and groups coming to Kosovo and Metohija represents a continuity of attacks on the Serbian people, cultural heritage, and Serbian spiritual legacy, as well as an attempt to carry out a culturocide against Serbs.

Lazić pointed out that Kosovo and Metohija is the cradle of spirituality and that the Serbian people, even after Pristina unilaterally declared independence, remained tied to their holy sites. "Many great nations and great civilizations had castles and fortresses. We had spiritual fortresses that preserved us in difficult times and formed our national identity," Lazić told SRNA. According to him, Pristina wants to commit a culturocide against Serbs in order to create its own national history and its own ideological and cultural pattern. "This issue with the so-called licensed guides represents another in a series of pressures aimed at breaking the relations between the Serbian population in Kosovo and Metohija and their motherland," Lazić pointed out. He emphasized that these pressures are also taking place through attacks coming from Nikola Xhufka and his so-called and unrecognized Kosovan church, incursions into temples, as well as the execution of works within the protected zone of the Visoki Dečani monastery, which is on the UNESCO World Heritage List. According to him, pressures in the Federation of BiH, Croatia, as well as assaults on the property of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Montenegro represent a general pattern and matrix by which an attempt is made to present Serbian cultural heritage as the heritage of another people, thereby ensuring that, based on a falsified history, that people gains some historical medieval continuity. "And these new guides announced by Pristina represent not only a form of culturocide but also a form of pressure on the monks, clergy, and people who, despite everything, survive in Kosovo and Metohija. It is an attempt to distort history with the aim of presenting the formation of this new identity that they have imagined and are trying to form by force and politically," stressed Lazić. However, as he says, the fact that Pristina's moves are becoming increasingly radical speaks to how deep the Serbian roots are in Kosovo and Metohija. "When you talk to people in Orahovac and in the Serbian enclaves, it is clear that the fact that Serbs visit them and that Serbian pilgrims come represents a kind of optimism for them and helps the survival of our people. So connected and so united through the holy sites that we have protected, and the holy sites have protected us, we have ensured historical continuity and survival," said Lazić. He believes there is no doubt that the introduction of "licensed tourist guides" is also directed at pressuring pilgrims from Serbia and Republika Srpska who come to Kosovo and Metohija. "It is clear that this is an attempt to intimidate them as well. A few months ago, we had a wonderful visit by students from Novi Sad to Kosovo and Metohija. It has become a tradition for children from central Serbia to go to the southern province and for children from the southern province to go to central Serbia. But, imagine how anyone will now allow children to go there in the presence of those 'auditors' of Pristina, that is, those so-called tourist guides," pointed out Lazić. He added that it is obvious that Pristina is increasingly pressing Serbs in every way and is not choosing its means to do so. "We also had shameful photographs that circulated around the region and the wider area. These are pictures of uniformed members of the so-called Kosovo police searching the stroller of a seven-month-old baby," Lazić emphasized. The Pristina authorities announced that starting from August 1st, all tourist groups during their stay in Kosovo and Metohija must be accompanied by a "licensed tourist guide," that they will "no longer allow foreign tourist guides to represent Kosovo as they please," and that they, as they state, distort their history. The Minister of Culture and Tourism of self-proclaimed Kosovo, Saranda Bogujevci, told Pristina media that the introduction of licensed guides establishes a mechanism that will serve both to supervise the work of tourist guides and to report cases of "distorting history".