Hope Bird, a musical troupe singing for the reunification of Korea, kicked off its European tour in Belgrade.
On Saturday, March 23, the troupe held a street performance at Zemun municipality in Belgrade. It’s hosted by the World Anti-imperialist Platform (the Platform) and the New Communist Party of Yugoslavia (NKPJ).
Many activists from across the Yugoslavian region gathered to commemorate the 25th anniversary of NATO’s bombing of Yugoslavia, which began on March 24, 1999.
Speaker of the Platform remarked “In this critical current situation, the World Anti-Imperialism Platform, together with South Korea’s representative anti-imperialist and anti-US cultural activities, a music troupe, will tour Europe for a month, starting from Belgrade, where the NATO bombed in 1999, and including Austria, Belgium, Germany, the UK and France. We will keep pushing forward on the path where the people will become the masters of a new society through the flames of anti-imperialism and anti-U.S.”, announcing the start of the performance.
Starting with the songs ‘Song of May 1’, ‘Song of May 2’, ‘Song of May 3’, the ‘Hope Bird’ performed the play ‘Stop, stop them. Never allow them’, and the songs ‘Under these mountains and streams’, ‘Don’t make it hurt’, ‘Listen Yankee’ and ‘Bella Ciao’.
The event was moderated by the League of Communist Youth of Yugoslavia (SKOJ), Ilija Živković. Explaining the background history of the performance, he stressed “Through the memory of Gwangju in May, the Korean people saw the true face of the United States, which they considered to be a blood alliance. Eighty years after liberation, the United States still stationed its troops on foreign soil, and the commander of the USFK (United States Forces in Korea) currently has wartime operational control of South Korea. As a sovereign state, this is unacceptable and shameful.”
The representative of the ‘Hope Bird’ said in his speech “Many people in Yugoslavia have suffered due to NATO and US imperialism. The situation of the Korean people have been in the same. Fighting against imperialism is the only way to achieve the true freedom and peace we want. Let’s make history with the power of the united people!”
Milos Karavezic, the First secretary of the SKOJ “The peoples of Serbia and Korea may be geographically distant, but they share a very similar fate. Almost 80 years ago, Americans divided Korea, and to this day, its southern part, just like Kosovo, remains under occupation.”, “These peoples do not want war, but once war is imposed upon you, you must fight to the end, to victory. Battles lie ahead for us too, but we are not afraid because we know that we will succeed in fighting for a new world, a world without exploitation, a world built to the measure of man, not capital. Together, with joint efforts, we will succeed!”, he added.
The speaker of the Platform remarked “The war in Ukraine in 2022 marked the beginning of World War 3. In 2023, the war in Palestine caused it to deepen. In 2024, the flames of world war spread to Taiwan and South Korea.”, “Today, in 2024, Serbia cannot escape from the important battlefields planned by imperialism … NATO and imperialist powers are falling apart. That is why they are clinging to war even more, but they cannot prevent their downfall,” she said.
She ended up the speech with strong resolution “Let the united struggle of the peoples of the world end imperialism and win true sovereignty and unity!”
After the speech of Aleksandar Banjanac, the General Secretary of the NKPJ, all participants sang ‘the International’ together.
The full video of the performance as below.
