New Serb unity day triggers worries across the Balkans

By DUSAN STOJANOVIC
Associated Press

BELGRADE, Serbia (AP) — Serbia has kicked off a new holiday celebrating national unity with a display of military power, triggering unease among its neighbors. The new holiday comes decades after similar calls for unity led to the bloody wars in the Balkans in the 1990s. Serbs in the region were told to display thousands of red, blue and white national flags wherever they live in the region or the world to mark “The Day of Serb Unity, Freedom and the National Flag.” Serbian officials are calling for the creation of a “Serb World,” or political unification of an estimated 1.3 million ethnic Serbs who live in Bosnia, Montenegro, Kosovo and Croatia, with Serbia.