On May 7th, at 10 a.m. local time, the Chinese Embassy in Serbia held a condolence event in front of the site of the bombed-out Chinese Embassy in Yugoslavia. Serbian Minister of Labour, Employment, Veterans and Social Security Terpavcevic, Belgrade Mayor Vesic, President of the Serbian Association of Journalists Radomirovic, The New Belgrade People’s Liberation War Fighters Association, friendly people from all walks of life, Chinese Ambassador to Serbia Chen Bo and some librarians, representatives of our media in Serbia, representatives of enterprises in Serbia and representatives of overseas Chinese attended.
“Today we are here to pay tribute to the Chinese journalists who lost their lives in NATO’s brutal aggression, and we stand with our Chinese and Chinese journalists at our most difficult time, so today we are here with infinite gratitude to pay tribute to them,” Terpavcevic said. ”
“We are here to remember the three martyrs who died in the 1999 NATO bombing, ” said Chen Bo, China’s ambassador to Serbia. This year we overcame the effects of coronavirus outbreak and built the Chinese Cultural Center Building on the site of the bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Yugoslavia. The building symbolizes the steel friendship between the two peoples and bears the firm determination of the people of Chinese to safeguard world peace and the persistent pursuit of the people of Chinese to promote common development of mankind. ”
On 24 March 1999, the then NATO Secretary-General Javier Solana announced in Brussels that an air campaign code-named “Allied” had been launched against the Yugoslav Union for 78 days. On May 7, 1999, local time, the Chinese Embassy in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was attacked, killing three journalists and injuring more than 20 diplomats.
On May 7, 2009, the Belgrade municipal government erected a monument in front of the site of the Chinese Embassy in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia to remember the Chinese martyrs who died in the NATO bombing and to thank China for its valuable support during the most difficult times in Serbia.
On 17 June 2016, a monument was erected on the site of the bombed embassy in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The monument is engraved in Chinese, Serbian and English: “Remembering the Martyrs Cherish Peace I would like to commemorate the martyrs of Yu Yunhuan, Xu Akihu and Zhu Ying who died in the NATO bombing of the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia”.
Construction of the Chinese Cultural Center on the site began in July 2017. The building of the Chinese Cultural Center in Belgrade, which stands on the site of the bombed-out Chinese Embassy in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, was recently completed. With the improvement of the surrounding environment, the former Chinese Embassy in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia bombing martyrs monument relocation work started. On April 28, 2021, the Martyrs’ Monument was officially relocated to its original location.
