Servia and Her Neighbors
The utterances of Servia's statesmen and people since the war began have not appeared in English. Only accounts of fighting by the nation from which the great conflagration started have been printed. How Servia has judged the issues while conducting her struggle against annihilation, and how the neighboring Balkan States regard her, are authoritatively presented below.
PREMIER PASHITCH spoke in the Skuptschina, or Servian Parliament, on Aug. 4, 1914, and made the following declaration given to the press by the Official Servian Bureau:
Mr. Pashitch laid stress on the fact that the Serajevo affair was used as pretext for the war, desired long ago by the Austrian Monarchy, which did not look on Pan-Serbism with a favorable eye, while the aspirations of other countries of Rumania, Germany, and Italy were tolerated. The Austro-Hungarian Monarchy wished to crush Servian aspirations by curbing the Servian prestige.
In answering the Austrian note, Mr. Pashitch said, we reached the extreme limits of submission to her demands. We did everything in order to avoid the conflict and prove that we were peaceful. Now, all united, we will defend our rights.
We rely on the sympathy and support of great and sisterly Russia, who knows that our foes have been conspiring against our independence and our progress, and who will not permit our prestige to be crushed. At the side of Russia we have other friends.
(Long live Russia! Long live England! Long live France! Long live the Triple Entente!)
I thank the Opposition—continued Mr. Pashitch—because she has united with us in these critical moments, forgetting in the face of danger party lines and the dissension of opinions.
From Nish the following official communication was telegraphed to the foreign press by the Government Bureau on Aug. 9, 1914: