Firm of Trump’s son-in-law to redevelop ex-Yugoslav army's site in Belgrade

"[...] the revitalisation of the complex will be done in accordance with the laws of Serbia and in cooperation with the government and all relevant institutions in the country, which are responsible for urban planning and the protection of cultural heritage," infrastructure minister Goran Vesic said in a press release on Wednesday when the deal was signed.

The value of the planned investment in the project was not disclosed.

In March, Jared Kushner said he was planning to develop two luxury real estate projects, in Serbia and Albania, and published visualisations of the projects set respectively on the Albanian coast and downtown Belgrade on social media platform X. The Belgrade project included a luxury hotel, an apartments complex with 1,500 residential units, and a museum.

In response to recent media and public speculation on the project, Vesic said that Serbia is not selling the land where the damaged building is located, adding it remains a state property. If the investor fails to complete the investment within the agreed term, it will return to Serbia the land and all that has been built on the site without compensation, Vesic said.

He noted that the investor has also committed to build at the site a memorial complex dedicated to the victims of the 1999 NATO bombing, as per the press release. The investor will finance the construction of the memorial complex, while the Serbian government will own and manage the facility.

Affinity Global Development's director general, Asher Abershera, said that Serbian architects and designers will be invited to present their ideas on the memorial complex.

In 1999, NATO launched a bombing campaign against strategic targets across the former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia aimed at stopping human rights abuses in its breakaway province of Kosovo. The bombing campaign, which killed several hundred civilians, led to the withdrawal of Yugoslav Army from Kosovo, the fall of Yugoslav strongman Slobodan Milosevic's regime and subsequently, to the establishment of independent Kosovo.