July 7^th

Company LUKOIL SRBIJA AD donated 500 000 RSD to the Institution for Daily Care of Children and Youth with Developmental Disabilities Mara and Center for family Accommodation and Adoption. 300 000 dinars donated to Mara and 200 000 donated to the Center would be used for the procurement of necessary equipment. The general manager of the Company LUKOIL SRBIJA AD Mr. Igor Semenicev, presented the money vouchers to the directors of the above mentioned institutions at Nis City Hall. The donation was part of the project Good Energy Initiating Good Deeds organized by the company LUKOIL with the support of the City of Nis, from 25 May to June 2 5at its five petrol stations where citizens voted and thus contributed so that the money was distributed properly.

“We are pleased that we participated in the project, and at the same time, strengthened the cooperation with the City. I am grateful to the City of Nis and to citizens who showed great interest in helping. Such projects are important. We will continue with this project in accordance with our capabilities and we will always try to meet the needs of the citizens”, said General Manager of LUKOIL Serbia Igor Semenicev. Nis City Mayor Darko Bulatovic thanked the management of LUKOIL Serbia and the citizens who participated in this initiative.

The Director of the Institution for Daily Care of Children and Youth with Developmental Disabilities Mara Milos Randjelovic and the Director of the Center for Family Accommodation and Adoption Violeta Blagojevic thanked the leadership of the City of Nis and LUKOIL Serbia AD for their help and stressed that this meant a lot to them.

July 5^th

Nis City Mayor Darko Bulatovic, with associates, visited the works on the construction of the Creative Center within the Faculty of Electronic Engineering. This facility will be dedicated to talented students and students in general who will be able to realize their ideas in this area and spend quality time. 41 million dinars of state funds will be allocated for this project, and the works should be completed by September 1^st this year. In the future, the Creative Center will be part of the large Science Technology Park, which will be built in the immediate vicinity of the Faculty of Electronic Engineering.

July 4^th

Nis City Mayor Darko Bulatovic, with his associates, visited the works on the reconstruction of the Summer Stage in the Nis Fortress. There are ongoing works on the part of the stage for the audience, where, after the completion of construction works, new chairs will be installed. According to the Mayor Bulatovic these works will be completed in 15 days, and, after that, the reconstruction of the wardrobes and toilet facilities will be done. Summer Stager in the Fortress, which hosts one of the most prestigious acting festivals, will be finally reconstructed. The reconstruction works amount to 15 million dinars, and funds have been provided by the Ministry of Trade and Tourism, within the framework of the support of the Government of the Republic of Serbia to our city.

At the ceremony held at Nis City Hall young athletes from Nis received today scholarship contracts, whose monthly amount is 6000 dinars, and represent a symbolic way of expressing gratitude to talented athletes, who in different disciplines defend the colors of this city and our country. A total of 56 scholarships were awarded on the basis of a decision of the expert commission. On this occasion Nis City Mayor Darko Bulatovic said that Serbia was the country of sports and that it had been proven by the achieved results in many sports discipline. The City of Nis recognizes the needs of young athletes and wants to help their further development.

Nis City Mayor Darko Bulatovic, and the Member of Nis City Council for Education, Bojan Krstic, welcomed at Nis City Hall the team from Nis who took part for the first time in the Festival Serbia in the Rhythm of Europe held in Sombor and they returned as the winning team.

The Member of the City Council Bojan Krstić, who was a member of the jury at this competition and traveled with competitors to Sombor, said that this was a special experience and that the young people from Nis, who performed singing in Turkish and representing Turkey, were the best according to the jury and the votes of the audience. Sanja Krstić, the participant in the competition, said that it was a great honor for them to participate in this event and represent their city. She pointed out that she was particularly happy that they returned from the first competition as first ranked.

Nis City Mayor Darko Bulatovic congratulated the children, but also their parents, and once again thanked the former Ambassador of Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Bozaj, who suggested that children from Nis should represent Turkey at this competition. He thanked the media representatives for their support and all Nis citizens who voted for  the team from Nis.

The students who won one of the first three places in national and international competitions in 2016/2017 school year, as a team or individually, were awarded city recognition awards. This year, 297 students won prestigious awards and showed that the City of Nis could be proud of its future generations. According to the Member of Nis City Council for Education Bojan Krstic, who addressed the audience on the behalf of the City of Nis, this award was an incentive for further work and progress, and the City of Nis would always be there to recognize hard work and talent.

The monument dedicated to the liberators is located at the central location of the city, King Milan Square. It presents the period of wars for liberation waged against the Turks, Bulgarians, and Germans. The monument contains inscriptions on the four most significant years of this period: 1874 and 1877 – the period of the fight for liberation from the Turks, and 1915 and 1918 – the beginning of the occupation and the liberation of the city in World War One. The monument is made of black marble and has a broad base with four reliefs, a bronze sculpture and a high pedestal whose lower part exhibits figural compositions of soldiers fighting. At the top of the monument there is a natural size horse rider – the Herald of Liberty, holding a flag. The monument was presented to the public on 28 June 1937, on the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Nis from the Turks. This monumental sculpture is one of the most significant creations of more modern Yugoslav art, made by the well-known sculptor from Zagreb, Croatia, Antun Augustincic. In 1983 it became protected by the law as part of the national heritage.

This year, for the first time in Nis, Nis Pride Week is organized, and it would last from June 27^th to July 2nd. The idea is to promote a culture of dialogue and tolerance, affecting the reduction of discrimination and homophobia, and increasing the visibility of the problems that the LGBT community encounters daily. Within the Pride Week the conference was held on the topic “Networking to Improve the Position of LGBT Persons in Serbia” during which the activists of  human rights organizations and representatives of relevant institutions discussed ways to overcome discrimination against people in terms of sexual orientation.

The Assistant Mayor Prof dr Nebojsa Randjelovic spoke on the behalf of the City of Nis at the conference and he said that the City of Nis, through the local network for fighting against discrimination of the LGBT population, together with other institutions, was actively involved in the fight against homophobic and discriminatory actions by individuals or groups. “For us, this is not just our wish to follow the world trends when the LGBT population is in question, but we want to engage in dialogue and involve all relevant institutions at the local level and, in practice, win against the discrimination that violates the basic rights of citizens”,  as Assistant Mayor Randjelovic said.

Nis City Mayor Darko Bulatovic and his associates met with H.E. Ambassador of the Russian Federation to Serbia Alexander Vasilevich Chepurin and talked about continuing and fostering traditionally good friendly relations with the Russian people, as well as cooperation between the City of Nis and the Russian City of Kaluga. The Mayor stressed on this occasion that the meeting with the Russian ambassador was the chance to present to him the projects that the city was implementing with the support of the Government of the Republic of Serbia. The Mayor and His Excellency agreed that the Nis Airport Constantine the Great was excellent connection between Kaluga and Nis, which would be twinned in several months, and that there was a great opportunity for establishing charter flights between the two cities. The two officials attended the ceremonial opening of the premises of the Society of Serbian-Russian Friendship Naisus and the First International Festival of Traditional Russian Drinks which was organized at Officers’s Mess Building in Nis.

June 22^nd

Deputy Prime Minister of Serbia, prof. Dr. Zorana Mihajlovic, visited the renovated building of the Nis Airport Constantine the Great, where, for less than a year, 70 million dinars were invested in the expansion of the terminal building and procurement of new equipment. Deputy Prime Minister Mihajlovic together with Nis City Mayor Darko Bulatovic and Airport General Manager Vladica Djurdjanovic visited reconstructed counters for check-in for the passengers and baggage. On this occasion Deputy PM Mihajlovic pointed out that, two years before, this airport had 1,225 passengers, and with great joint team work, the number of passengers this year was increased to 140,000. “Last year we had a total of 122,000 passengers, and to date, this year there are 140,000 at the Nis airport. This is really a success, “Mihajlovic said, adding that efforts would be made in the coming years to increase the number of passengers at the Nis airport to 550,000 by 2020. In the past two and a half years, cargo transportation increased the volume six times. As of now, Nis Airport has 11 lines – Basel, Malmo, Memingen, Eindhoven, Dortmund, Düsseldorf, Berlin, Bratislava, Milan, Stockholm and Zurich. Constantine the Great is a regional airport, and Nis is very important for Serbia and the Western Balkans. It is up to us to take advantage of the strategic location of Nis. Many talked about the leadership position of this city, and we are trying to show it through the results, “said Deputy PM Mihajlovic.

She added the government invested in the airport in Nis during previous period and that it would continue to do so, and the plan was for the total investments to be around 6.5 million euros. About four million euros will be invested in the tower and expansion of the terminals and an investment of between 2 and 2.5 million euros is planned for landing and launching devices under the bad weather conditions. “These investments are important because the Nis Airport should be an alternative to Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport. It is our interest to increase the number of passengers and to use Nis as a cargo center and we will succeed in that, “said Mihajlovic.

Mayor Bulatovic said that nobody invested in Nis airport as this government for the past few years. “Constantine the Great Airport would not survive without the support we had from Deputy PM Mihajlovic and her ministry. Thanks to the state, we managed to get on our feet and jointly create the conditions for the airport to develop and to be, not only Nis airport, but also the entire southeast of the country and beyond airport, “said Mayor Bulatovic. He said that the reconstruction of existing capacities would be continued as well as the upgrading. Currently, the works are being carried out on further reconstruction of terminal infrastructure, the construction of the missing hangar and parking space, worth 7.5 million euros. 30 million dinars were invested in the airport building, which was made 30 years before, in the repair of the roof and facades and in the increase in the number of counters, from 2 to 4 while 40 million were invested in equipment, first of all in the new X-Ray Inspection Devices for passengers and hand luggage. The second phase of the reconstruction begins in 2018, with the aim of increasing or doubling the capacity of the terminal.