Belgrade Yuri Gagarin monument shrinks away after head jibes

Stream of sarcasm and parodies about scale of bust to plinth leads to it being dismantled

In 1961, Yuri Gagarin's legendary space flight lasted just 108 minutes. A monument in Belgrade to the first person in space did not last much longer, being swiftly dismantled after causing online hilarity owing to its curiously small head.

On Sunday, a number of Serbian websites noticed that a monument to the cosmonaut had appeared on a street in the Serbian capital that beared his name. The large plinth and the small bust of Gagarin's head prompted the website Noizz to quip: "The only way you can see it clearly is to launch yourself into the sky."