Serbian Chess Federation is saddened to inform the public that International Master Dr Srecko Nedeljkovic passed away on 2nd January in Belgrade, at the age of 88.

Prof Dr Srecko Nedeljkovic was born on 4th December 1923 in Dragacevo. His elder brother taught him to play chess when he was 13. He moved to Belgrade after the second World War, in 1946, and immediately caught attention in the first Army championship, where he shared 2nd place.

He earned the title of the National Master at the 4th Yugoslav Championship in 1948/49 and in 1950 he won the first place in the very strong Belgrade International tournament. For this result FIDE awarded him the title of International Master that same year.

Being occupied with the scientific career, he couldn't play much in the individual tournaments, but he devoted great attention to the Yugoslav national team and his club Crvena Zvezda.

Dr Srecko Nedeljkovic has spent 30 years with the national team, as player, trainer, second or captain. He trained the Yugoslav team which won the gold medal at the 9th Chess Olympiad in 1950 in Dubrovnik. He was team captain at the Olympiads in Moscow 1956, Havana 1966 and Buenos Aires 1978, and at the European Team Championship in 1980 in Sweden.

As a player he won two silver medals at the ETCC in Baden-Baden 1957 and Oberhausen 1961. In addition, he played in numerous friendly matches, a great diplomatic happening of that time - against USSR, Austria, Netherlands, Switzerland, Sweden, Finland, France, Italy, West Germany, Belgium, England, Bulgaria and Hungary.

He was founder (1947) and lifetime member of the famous chess club Crvena Zvezda (Red Star).

The Nedeljkovic family was the first chess family in Yugoslavia. Srecko's wife Verica Nedeljkovic is WGM and formerly one of the top woman players in the world. His two sons and grandson are Candidate Masters.

Apart from his chess accomplishments, Dr Nedeljkovic had an outstanding career in the field of medical science. He graduated from the Faculty of Medicine in Belgrade in 1952. He had been working there as a teaching assistant until 1959, when he became a professor. During his tenure with the Faculty of Medicine (1959-1989) he also chaired the Institute for the Cardiovascular Diseases as one of its founders. His professional excellence earned him a unique opportunity to work with Michael DeBakey, a world-renowned cardiac surgeon. Dr Nedeljkovic's body of work comprised of 8 books, 212 scientific articles and 136 professional papers.