10.10.2011.

Iraqi Cultural Week in Belgrade

The second Iraqi Cultural Week, which will include concerts, exhibitions, lectures and a film screening, was opened today in the Military Club in Belgrade, with the attendance of the Defence Minister Dragan Sutanovac, Iraqi Ambassador to Serbia Falah Abdulsada, the representatives of the Ministry of Defence and Serbian Armed Forces, the military-diplomatic corps as well as the members of the Serbian and Iraqi cultural life.

While opening the event, the Defence Minister Dragan Sutanovac emphasised it was his honour to open the second Iraqi Cultural Week.

- Within a decade of good relations between our country and Iraq we have built the same kind of relations in the defence field as well. Today, they are the pillar of the cooperation between Iraq and Serbia. That pillar does not only imply the cooperation at the military-military level, but the cooperation in the field of culture - and I remind you that we had a cooperation in the field of military sport as well – Minister Sutanovac said, adding he visited Iraq three times during his four-year mandate.

- I have seen the progress the Iraqi society achieved. Serbia is willing to participate in the reconstruction of Iraq and, of course, in the promotion of the Iraqi culture, in the same manner it is doing that tonight – Sutanovac said.

Recently, when the Iraqi Minister of Foreign Affairs attended the conference of non-aligned countries in Belgrade, the Serbian President’s visit to Iraq was discussed, Sutanovac said, expressing his conviction that the visit would soon take place and that it would particularly be important from the aspect of the development of bilateral cooperation, military and economic.

- In my talks with friends from the Arab World every agreement ended with “inshallah“(God willing). Inshallah for that visit and inshallah for the progress of the Iraqi people – Minister Sutanovac said.

At the opening ceremony, Ambassador Falah Abdulsada said that the sketches of the artists, the voices of the singers and the tone and melodies of the instruments were effective means for spreading peace among people.

- The first law in the world was written by an Iraqi hand. Today, in this land, where the Danube and Sava meet, the intellectuals and the creators of Iraq meet sons and daughters of Serbia, the heirs of the Vinca civilization, so as to create wonderful, unique, cultural and humane pulse, which derives its strength and determination from such a great civilizational heritage. Today, sons and daughters of the new, democratic Iraq are among us. Carrying olive branches and singing songs of peace, in the next seven days, the children of the Tigris and Euphrates will outline the dreams of better future, full of progress and prosperity, free of wars and accompanying distress – Ambassador Abdulsada said, expressing his hope that the Iraqi Cultural Week in Belgrade would become traditional event in which the real face of the new Iraqi daily life would be shown.

The second Iraqi Cultural Week was opened with the exhibition of Hussein Al-Juman’s paintings and artist’s Mazin Mundir’s handicrafts. Also, a band Al-Armaui held a concert.

Until October 16, a band Al-Akhueien will also hold a concert, whereas the Yugoslav Film Archive is to show a movie „Son of Babylon“directed by Mohamed Al-Daradji, which achieved a great success at the European film festivals last year.

Together with the artists, a delegation from the Iraqi Journalists’ Association is expected to attend the Iraqi Cultural Week in Belgrade. The journalists’ delegation should sign a cooperation agreement with the Serbian Journalists’ Association. The Iraqi Journalists’ Association representative will hold a lecture about the condition in the Iraqi media after the fall of the Saddam Hussein’s regime at the Faculty of Political Science.

The second Week of the Iraqi culture is organised by the Iraqi Embassy in Serbia.