Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Braće Fejića
Walking along the modern town's main café strip, enjoy the opportunity to observe this
workaday Bosniak town. You'll see the humble offices of the ragtag B&H Airlines; a state-
run gambling office (Lutrija BIH) taxing its less-educated people with a state lottery; and
lots of cafés that serve drinks but no food. People generally eat at home before going out to
nurse an affordable drink. (Café ABC has good cakes and ice cream; the upstairs is a popu-
lar pizza hangout for students and families.)
At the small mosque on the left, obituary announcements are tacked to the tree, listing
the bios and funeral times for locals who have recently died. A fig tree grows out of the
mosque's minaret, just an accident of nature illustrating how that plant can thrive with al-
most no soil (somehow, the Bosniaks can relate). Walking farther, look back and up to see
a few ruins—still ugly nearly two decades after the war. There's a messy confusion about
whoownswhatinMostar.Survivingcompanieshavenomoney.YugoBank,whichheldthe
mortgages, is defunct. No one will invest until clear ownership is established. Until then,
the people of Mostar sip their coffee in the shadow of these jagged reminders of the warfare
that wracked this town a couple of decades ago.
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Braće Fejića
The Dawn of War in Mostar
Mostar was always one of the most stubbornly independent parts of the former
Yugoslavia. It had one of the highest rates of mixed-ethnicity marriages in all of
Bosnia-Herzegovina. In the early 1990s, Mostar's demographics were proportioned
more or less evenly—about 35 percent of its residents were Bosniaks, 34 percent
Croats, and 19 percent Serbs. But this delicate balance was shattered in a few brutal
months of warfare.
On April 1, 1992, Bosnia-Herzegovina—led by Muslim president Alija Izetbe-
govi
ć
—declared independence from Yugoslavia. Very quickly, the Serb-dominated
Yugoslav People's Army moved to stake their claim on territory throughout the
country, including the important city of Mostar. On April 3, Serb forces occupied
the east end of town (including the Ottoman Old Town), forcing many resid-
ents—predominantly Croats and Bosniaks—to hole up in the western part of the city.
Meanwhile, Serbian and Croatian leaders were secretly meeting to divvy up Bosnian
territory, and by early May, they'd agreed that Croatia would claim Mostar. Several
weekslater,whenthejointCroat-Bosniakforcescrossedbackovertheriver,theSerb
forces mysteriously withdrew from the city (having been directed to capitulate), and
retreated tothemountaintops abovetown.TheCroats andBosniaks, believing they'd
