Serbian Chamber of Commerce president Marko Čadež on Tuesday presented a Croatian Embassy representative in Belgrade with a €50,000 donation for the people of Croatia affected by a 29 December earthquake.

Čadež said the goal was for the money “to come there where it is needed most as soon as possible.”

He recalled that the Serbian government had been among the first to donate €1 million for the quake victims, and invited business people from all over Serbia to donate all that was necessary.

“Our economies are much more connected than we can imagine. Our jobs are connected, our productions are connected, our supply chains are connected. The Serbian economy is very interested in helping friends in distress, in helping the people in Croatia,” Čadež said.

He said he hoped that after this first tranche of aid for temporary accommodation, Serbian companies would also donate construction material for the reconstruction of houses.

Maja Bogdan, charge d’affaires at the Croatian Embassy, thanked Čadež, the Chamber and all Serbian businesses for the €50,000 donation. “We are deeply touched by the expressions of solidarity at this difficult time for the people affected by the earthquake.”

Čadež symbolically presented Bogdan with the donation at a ceremony held in Belgrade’s Kelemegdan Park. The ceremony was organised in front of a sculpture made by sculptor Simeon Roksandić, born in 1874 in Majske Poljane, a village in Croatia hit by the earthquake.

The executive director of the Serbian Philanthropic Forum, Veran Matić, said it was an assembly of solidarity with the quake victims and called on everyone who could to participate in such humanitarian campaigns.

A symbolic assembly of solidarity was also held in Zagreb by the replica of the same sculpture in the presence of representatives of the Serb National Council and the Serbian Embassy to Croatia.