Macut in Banja Luka for Serb Unity Day

Serbian Prime Minister Djuro Macut is meeting his Republika Srpska counterpart Savo Minic in Banja Luka today, September 14, 2026, the Srna news agency reports. After their talks, both prime ministers head to the central celebration of Serb Unity, Freedom and National Flag Day, a holiday Belgrade and Banja Luka have marked together since 2020 and one that once again puts the leadership of both governments on the same stage. For Serbia this is no mere protocol visit, but confirmation that the relationship with Republika Srpska is being run at the level of the two prime ministers, not just through statements.

The central ceremony begins tonight at 8 p.m. at the Borik Sports Hall in Banja Luka, jointly organized by the governments of Republika Srpska and Serbia. Republika Srpska’s Ministry of Labor and Veteran-Disability Protection has called on citizens, towns and municipalities, institutions and organizations to join the commemoration and to fly the flag of Republika Srpska alongside the Serbian national flag on their homes and buildings. According to the city administration, the streets of Banja Luka are already decorated with both flags ahead of tonight’s program.

When did Serb Unity Day begin?

The holiday was established in 2020 to strengthen the unity of the Serb people in Serbia and Republika Srpska and to reinforce the cult of the national flag. The date, September 15, is tied to the breakthrough of the Thessaloniki Front in World War I, so Banja Luka and Belgrade mark it every year around that anniversary, with the main ceremony, as this year, typically held the day before.

Dodik: Credit goes to Vucic

Milorad Dodik, president of the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats, posted a message on X this morning marking the holiday, crediting the relationship between the two sides to the policies of Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic.

“The Drina has never been the border of one people, one faith, language, history and memory. Today Serbia and Republika Srpska breathe and live as one, and much of the credit for that belongs to Aleksandar Vucic, who understood that administrative borders are to be respected, but that they need not be walls between Serbs,” Dodik wrote.

In the same post he added that “its most beautiful symbol is the Serbian tricolor,” along with the message: “Long live Serbia! Long live Republika Srpska!” Dodik’s post also points to something older and stronger than administrative borders, a shared belonging to a single Serb identity that, in his words, transcends lines drawn from the outside.

Karan: The tricolor as a sign of endurance

Republika Srpska President Sinisa Karan gave a statement to Srna for the holiday, describing the Serbian flag as a symbol of historical continuity.

“The Serbian tricolor is a sign of our historical endurance. In it we recognize victories and suffering, uprisings and liberations, the fight against fascism and Nazism, and the generations who safeguarded the Serbian people’s right to a name, an identity and freedom,” Karan said.

Karan added that freedom for the Serb people “was never something to be taken for granted,” and that “preserving Republika Srpska is therefore a lasting political and historical responsibility.” According to him, jointly marking dates of national significance shows that the shared memory of the two entities does not depend on where people live.

What this means for Belgrade-Banja Luka relations

Karan used his statement to Srna to tie the holiday to the broader course of cooperation as well, saying that the policy he and Vucic pursue keeps relations between the two sides at “the highest level” and that, thanks to it, support from Serbia reaches towns and municipalities across Republika Srpska, as well as communities where Serbs live in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. As the framework for that cooperation, he cited the Declaration on the Protection of National and Political Rights and the Common Future of the Serb People, adopted at the All-Serb Assembly, a document both sides’ political rhetoric has used as a reference point ever since.

For Serbia, tonight’s program at Borik is therefore more than a date on the calendar: it is a chance to publicly confirm, with both prime ministers present, the continuity of a policy that in recent years has connected Belgrade and Banja Luka through roads, the economy and institutions, as Karan himself put it in his statement. Whether any of that cooperation will take on a concrete new form, in the shape of an agreement or an announcement, remains open until tonight’s speeches at the Borik hall.