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BOSNIA & HERZEGOVINA

The War Torn Country Struggles to Re-balance Itself

By Liz Goldner

The province of Kosovo in southern Serbia has been under United Nations administration since 1999. Kosovo is governed by the United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) and the local Provisional Institutions of Self-Government, with security provided by the NATO-led Kosovo Force (KFOR).

The province is the subject of a long-running political and territorial dispute between the Serbian (and previously, the Yugoslav) government and Kosovo's Albanian population. It is also the location for soil collection from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Alen Savatic, writing from Sarajevo explains. “I collected the soil sample from the park between the Olympic Stadium, where the opening ceremony of 1984 Winter Olympic Games was held, and the Olympic Hall Zetra, where the ice hockey games and the speed skating were held.”

Bosnia and Herzegovina is on the Balkan peninsula of Southern Europe. The country is home to three ethnic "constituent peoples": Bosniaks, Serbs and Croats. In Bosnia, the distinction between a Bosnian and a Herzegovinian is a regional, rather than an ethnic distinction. The country is decentralized and comprises two entities, the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Republika Srpska.

The country is bordered by Croatia to the north, west and south, Serbia to the east, and Montenegro to the south, The interior of the country is mountainous in the center and south, hilly in the northwest, and flat in the northeast. The nation's capital and largest city is Sarajevo, site of the 1984 Winter Olympic Games.

Bosnia and Herzegovina, formerly part of Yugoslavia, gained independence during the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s.

The country has had a long tumultuous history going back more than 1,000 years and involving conquest by the Ottomans in the 16th century. Although the kingdom had been crushed and its high nobility executed, the Ottomans allowed the preservation of Bosnia's identity by incorporating it as an integral province of the Ottoman Empire with its historical name and territorial integrity.

Four centuries of Ottoman rule, however, had a drastic impact on Bosnia's population make-up. Eventually, a native Slavic-speaking Muslim community emerged and became the largest of the ethno-religious groups, mainly as a result of a gradually rising number of conversions to Islam. A significant number of Sephardim Jews also arrived there, following expulsion from Spain in the late fifteenth century. In addition, the Bosnian Christian communities experienced major changes; while the Bosnian Franciscans (and the Catholic population as a whole) were protected by official imperial decree, these guarantees were often disregarded and their numbers dwindled.

As the Ottoman Empire thrived and expanded into Central Europe, Bosnia experienced a prolonged period of general welfare and prosperity. Cities, such as Sarajevo and Mostar, were established and grew into major regional centers of trade and urban culture. Within these cities, various Sultans and governors financed\ construction of many important works of Bosnian architecture, such as the Stari most and Gazi Husrev-beg's Mosque.

In addition, numerous Bosnians played influential roles in the Ottoman Empire's cultural and political history. Bosnian soldiers formed a large component of the Ottoman ranks in important battles, while numerous Bosnians rose through the ranks of the Ottoman military bureaucracy to occupy the highest positions of power in the Empire, including admirals, generals, and grand viziers. Many Bosnians also made a lasting impression on Ottoman culture, emerging as mystics, scholars, and celebrated poets in the Turkish, Arabic, and Persian languages.

The establishment of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in 1929brought the redrawing of administrative regions into banates that purposely avoided all historical and ethnic lines, removing any trace of a Bosnian entity. Serbo-Croat tensions over the structuring of the Yugoslav state continued, with a separate Bosnian division receiving little or no consideration. The Cvetkoviç-Maãek agreement that created the Croatian banate in 1939 encouraged a partition of Bosnia between Croatia and Serbia. Meanwhile, outside political circumstances forced Yugoslav politicians to shift their attention to the rising threat posed by Nazi Germany. Yugoslavia was invaded by Germany on April 6, 1941.

World War II

Once the kingdom of Yugoslavia was conquered by Nazi forces in World War II, all of Bosnia was ceded to the Independent State of Croatia. Nazi rule over Bosnia led to widespread persecution of Jewish, Serbian and Gypsy civilians. The Jewish population was nearly exterminated and roughly 750,000 Serbs died. Many Serbs in the area took up arms and joined the Chetnik, a Serb nationalist and royalist resistance movement that conducted guerrilla warfare against the Nazis but then switched to fight the Partisans.

Starting in 1941, Yugoslav communists under the leadership of Josip Broz Tito organized their own multi-ethnic resistance group, the partisans, who fought against Axis and Chetnik forces. On November 25, 1943, the Anti-Fascist Council of National Liberation of Yugoslavia with Tito at its helm held a founding conference in Jajce where Bosnia and Herzegovina was reestablished as a republic within the Yugoslavian federation in its Ottoman borders.

The end of the war resulted in the establishment of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, with the constitution of 1946 officially making Bosnia and Herzegovina one of six constituent republics in the new state.

The Bosnian War

The 1990 parliamentary elections led to a national assembly dominated by three ethnically-based parties, which had formed a loose coalition to oust the communists from power. Croatia and Slovenia's subsequent declarations of independence and warfare placed Bosnia and Herzegovina in an awkward position. A significant split soon developed on whether to stay with the Yugoslav federation (overwhelmingly favored among Serbs) or seek independence (overwhelmingly favored among Bosniaks and Croats).

A declaration of sovereignty in October 1991 was followed by a referendum for independence from Yugoslavia in February and March 1992, boycotted by the great majority of Bosnian Serbs. The turnout in the independence referendum was 63.7% and 99.4% voted for independence. The controversy lies in the fact that the referendum failed to surpass the constitutional two-third required majority, so legally it failed too. Following a tense period of escalating tensions and sporadic military incidents, open warfare began in Sarajevo on April 6.

In March 1994, the signing of the Washington accords between the leaders of the republican government and Herzeg-Bosnia led to the creation of a joint Bosniak-Croat Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The signing of the Dayton Agreement in Dayton, Ohio by the presidents of Bosnia and Herzegovina brought a halt to the fighting, roughly establishing the basic structure of the present-day state.

The most recent research places the number of victims at around 100,000 to 110,000 killed (civilians and military) and 1.8 million displaced. Bosnia and Herzegovina sued Serbia and Montenegro for the act of genocide and the International Court of Justice ruled that the Serbian state could not be held responsible for the mass killing, or complicity in the act. The ICJ did find them at fault for not preventing the genocide.

War crimes

The International Court of Justice (ICJ), the judicial organ of the United Nations, found in 2007 that Serbia had violated the obligation to prevent genocide, under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crimes of Genocide (1951). Serbia was nonetheless found not guilty by the court of "committing genocide", "conspiring to commit genocide" or being "complicit in genocide".

The system of government established by the Dayton Accord is an example of consociationalism, as representation is by elites who represent the country's three major groups, with each having a guaranteed share of power. The Chair of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina rotates among three members (Bosniak, Serb, Croat), each elected as the Chair for an eight-month term within their four-year term as a member.

Geography

Bosnia is l in the western Balkans, bordering Croatia to the north and south-west, Serbia to the east, and Montenegro to the southeast. The country is mostly mountainous, encompassing the central Dinaric Alps. The northeastern parts reach into the Pannonian basin, while in the south it borders the Adriatic. The country has only 20 kilometers (12 miles) of coastline, around the town of Neum where there are many hotels and an is important tourism destination.

The country's name comes from the two regions Bosnia and Herzegovina, which have a very vaguely defined border between them. Bosnia occupies the northern areas, which are roughly four fifths of the entire country, while Herzegovina occupies the rest in the south part of the country.

The major cities are the capital Sarajevo, Banja Luka in the northwest region known as Bosanska Krajina, Bijeljina and Tuzla in the northeast, Zenica in the central part of Bosnia and Mostar, the capital of Herzegovina.

The south part of Bosnia has Mediterranean climate and a great deal of agriculture. Central Bosnia is the most mountainous part of Bosnia featuring predominate mountains Vlasic, Cvrsnica, and Prenj. Eastern Bosnia also features mountains like Trebevic, Jahorina, Igman, Bjelasnica and Treskavica.

Eastern Bosnia is heavily forested along the river Drina. Northern Bosnia contains very fertile agricultural land along the river Sava and the corresponding area is heavily farmed. This farmland is a part of the Parapannonian Plain stretching into neighboring Croatia and Serbia. The river Sava and corresponding Posavina river basin hold the cities of Brcko, Bosanski Samac, Bosanski Brod and Bosanska Gradiska.

The northwest part of Bosnia is called Bosanska Krajina and holds the cities of Banja Luka, Sanski Most, Cazin, Velika Kladisa and Bihaç. Kozara National Park is in this forested region.

There are seven major rivers in the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina: The Una river in the northwest part of Bosnia flows along the northern and western border of Bosnia and Croatia and through the Bosnian city of Bihac. It is a very beautiful river and popular for rafting and adventure sports. The Sana flows through the city of Sanski Most and is a tributary of the river Sava in the north.

The Vrbas flows through the cities of Gornji Vakuf - Uskoplje, Bugojno, Jajce and Banja Luka and reaches the river Sava in the north. The Vrbas flows through the central part of Bosnia and flows outwards to the North. The River Bosna is the longest river in Bosnia and is fully contained within the country as it stretches from its source near Sarajevo to the river Sava in the north. The Drina flows through the eastern part of Bosnia, at many places in the border between Bosnia and Serbia.

The Neretva river is in Central and Southern Bosnia, flowing from Jablanica south to the Adriatic Sea. The river is famous as it flows through the famous city of Mostar.

The Sava river flows through Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia. Sava creates a natural border between Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia and towns like Brcko, Bosanski Samac,

Tourism

According to an estimation of the World Tourism Organization, Bosnia and Herzegovina will have the third highest tourism growth rate in the world between 1995 and 2020.

Sarajevo, the national capital, hosted the 1984 Winter Olympic Games, at the time, the largest Winter Games ever (in terms of athletes and media). The country lost its reputation as an excellent ski destination during the war-torn period between 1992 and 1995.

Education

Bosnian education is one of the most dynamic, progressive and intellectually rigorous education systems in the world. Two Bosnian natives were awarded Nobel Prizes: Vladimir Prelog, for chemistry in 1975, and Ivo Andriç, for literature in 1961; ex-Yugoslavia had three Nobel Prize winners, the third being Lavoslav RuÏiãka from Croatia.

Bosnia’s current educational system—with seven universities, one in every major city, plus satellite campuses—continues to turn out highly-educated graduates in math, science and literature. However, they have not been modernized in last 15 years due to the war and various political and economic reasons and as a result do not meet Western educational standards, which are part of criteria for EU membership. The need for reform of the current Bosnian education system is generally acknowledged although specific methods for its change have still not been formulated.

Bosnia has a rich culture, including poets such as Mak Dizdar and Abdulah Sidran; writers such as Dzevad Karahasan, Aleksandar Hemon, Miljenko Jergovic, Dario Dzamonja and Nedzad Ibrisimovic; and musicians such as Dino Merlin and Tomo Miliãeviç. Ivo Andriç won the Nobel Prize for Literature, while Vladimir Prelog won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1975.

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