The 56^th International Belgrade Book Fair, a cultural event putting Belgrade and Serbia to the maps of Europe and the world, started at Belgrade Fair. At the same time, another two international events were opened – EDUCATIONAL EQUIPMENT, Modern Teaching Equipment and Accessories Fair and THE BELL, Education Fair.

On behalf of all Portuguese speaking countries, this year’s Guest of Honor at the Book Fair, Mr. Mia Couto, a famous Mozambique writer, spoke at the Festive Opening:

- The language celebrated today at Belgrade Fair is the official language of eight nations distributed on four continents – Angola, Brazil, Guinea Bissau, Cape Verde, East Timor, Mozambique, Portugal and São Tomé e Príncipe. More than 200 million people not only speak Portuguese, but also dreams and loves in Portuguese. However, the fact that these distant nations share a mutual language does not make them one homeland. Each of these countries is a special entity, a place where also other cultures live, other languages, different religions.

- In the forthcoming days, we shall celebrate in this space individual voices expressed in the same language. Each writer creates his own universe and he can represent only himself. Proust used to say that books are always written in a sort of a foreign language. Expressing themselves in Portuguese, the writers present here write in a language being only theirs. The travels born from this get together will not pass any geographic regions, but interior universes. These imagined worlds of magic and fascination are mutual for all people of all languages and all cultures. Sail on these destinies to the nameless destinations and I wish a pleasant journey to all of you, said Mr. Mia Couto to Belgrade’s audience.

The honor of pronouncing the 56^th BOOK FAIR open belonged this year to Mr. Svetislav Basara, a great Serbian novel and essay writer and a brilliant pen polemist, who said one should not worry about some terrifying warnings that religion is in crisis:

- Religion just should be in crisis, religion actually is nothing else but continuous staying in the crisis and the crisis overcoming. If we just look around, we shall see that the religion opponent is in an even greater crisis, like the false mercantilism world, greed, unrestrained acquiring and spending, the world that falls apart fast in front of our eyes. But, there disappears and falls apart only what really should disappear and fall apart.

At the end of his speech, Mr. Basara said he did not share the opinion and optimism of those believing a new quality and a new society would arise from this great confusion, perhaps even a new culture. He pointed out his only optimism source was the power by which the book resists the attacks of new technologies and the nonintrusive persistence by which it survives in the variety of superficial pleasures.