With a two-day commemorative programme organised by the Community of Serbs in Macedonia - Bitola, the 110th anniversary of the Battle of Kajmakchalan was marked. The programme began with flowers laid at the Serbian military cemetery in Bitola, continued with a ceremonial academy at the Officers' Club, and the central commemoration was held on Nidzhe peak itself, at the St. Peter memorial chapel.

The battle was fought from 12 to 30 September 1916 at 2,524 metres above sea level, as part of the Monastir offensive on the Salonika Front. It holds a special place in Serbian historical memory: the Serbian army called the heights of Kajmakchalan, reached at the cost of terrible bloodshed, the "Gate of the Homeland".

The level of attendance shows how much this matters to Belgrade. Serbia's Minister of Labour and Social Affairs, Milica Djurdjevic Stamenkovski, was at the commemoration in Bitola. The Serbian Orthodox Church, with the blessing of Patriarch Porfirije, sent Vicar Bishop Aleksej, who was received in Bitola by Metropolitan Petar of Prespa and Pelagonia. For Bitola, deputy mayor Marina Krstikj laid flowers.

"The hearts of our grandfathers stayed on Kajmakchalan, where the 'Gate of Freedom' opened, and their souls stayed in the homeland they never returned to," said Djurdjevic Stamenkovski. The president of the Bitola Community of Serbs, Zoran Zhugikj, said: "If we forget Kajmakchalan, we will forget who we are, where we come from and how dear our freedom was."

Respect for fallen soldiers is right and proper, on any side of any war. The minister also called the military cemeteries a symbol of closeness between the Macedonian and Serbian peoples, and that closeness is real. But Kajmakchalan is in the Bitola region, and the Salonika Front was fought on Macedonian soil.

So it is worth asking: do Macedonian institutions have their own story about that front and about the people from these parts who lived through that war - or, a hundred and ten years on, is the story told only by others, while local officials turn up to lay flowers at their commemorations?