I went to Novi Sad on 7 July, to hand over a patrol vehicle to the head of the local police. We are just coming up to the annual EXIT rock festival in Novi Sad, and this year, as for the last two years, we are expecting about 9000 Brits to turn up. They arrive in various ways, some by air via Belgrade or Budapest, others by bus, train or car: many will spend four or more nights camping at a special festival camp site. Altogether, some 100,000 people will attend over the whole period of the festival, but visitors from the UK make up the largest single foreign contingent. Many of the guest bands are British too.
Naturally, this great influx of visitors imposes a considerable burden on the local administration, the police in particular, and over the last few years we have worked very closely with them in the run-up to each year's festival. This year, we arranged for two Novi Sad police officers to visit the Glastonbury festival, so they could see how the Somerset police manage things, and when we asked what else they needed, they said some support with vehicles. Which is why I handed over the keys to a new Skoda (the same make as their existing cars) this morning. It will help them patrol the event better, and when that's over they will assign it permanently to the 'foreign visitors' section of the police car pool, so it will go on helping them to support the growing number of tourists who come to Novi Sad.
After that I went with the Mayor and police chief to look at the camp site, where many Brits have already arrived. The site is new this year: last year one visitor from Macedonia was killed when a branch fell from a tree at the well-wooded site, and so they had to find somewhere new, and safe. The first idea was to place the camp by the river, but the Danube is very high this year and that site flooded. So the plans changed again, and another site was found, at an old army barracks within the Petrovaradin fortress itself (the festival site). Everything had to be got ready at top speed, but they managed it, and the first arrivals seemed very happy with what they found.
EXIT opens on Thursday; we will have an Embassy team on hand, to help with any consular problems. Let's hope there aren't any serious issues to deal with, and they can just enjoy the music too!
Posted at 09:30 08 July 2009 by Stephen Wordsworth | Comments[6]
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