Assassinated Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic was buried in Belgrade's main cemetery with highest military honors as hundreds of thousands of people filed silently along the streets of the Serbian capital.
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Hundreds of thousands of people walk in a silent procession towards Belgrade's New Cemetery where slain Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic was laid to rest. Photo: Ivan Milutinovic / Reuters
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Military guards fired a three-gun salute before his coffin was lowered into the ground at the cemetery's Merit Alley.
Djindjic's assassination on Wednesday was the first of a European head of government since Swedish prime minister Olof Palme was shot dead on a Stockholm street in 1986.
Before the funeral, his coffin, draped with the blue, white and red Serbian flag, was displayed in Saint Sava church for a requiem service, which began at noon, in the presence of Serbian Orthodox Patriarch Pavle and several archbishops.
"Zoran Djindjic will be remembered for holding out his hand of brotherly peace and reconciliation to Europe and the world," Archbishop Amfilohije said during the service.
"His loss warns and reminds all the people and nations... Enough with hate, enough with wars and fratricide," the archbishop said.
The church was full while tens of thousands of people gathered outside, holding photographs of Djindjic, flowers and candles.
As the funeral procession moved towards the cemetery people in tears stood four or five deep.
The prime ministers of Albania, Austria, Croatia, Hungary, Macedonia, Romania and Slovakia attended the service, along with Greek Foreign Minister Mr George Papandreou, representing the current presidency of the European Union.
The UN representatives in Bosnia and Kosovo, Mr Paddy Ashdown and Mr Michael Steiner, and European Commission chief Romani Prodi were among more than 70 foreign delegations attending the funeral.
AFP