We sat round a rough table outside the tent and chatted, as I idly watched some clouds beginning to gather in the distance and silently mar velled at the Drina sparkling in the sunlight thousands of feet below us and the tumbling cliffs pouring down the mountains into the valley below. This is where the Emperor Diocletian in the third century drew the line to separate the Eastern and the Western Roman Empires.
Ahmed’s life story, as he told it to me in the slanting sunlight on his little patch of land on the mountainside, was just a modern version of the fate of so many particles of human dust caught up in the conflicts spawned by this great fault line down the march of the centuries.
A Muslim, he had been born in this house, as had his father and his grandfather before him. His grandfather had lived to a hundred and twenty-five, and his father to over a hundred. The land round here and the special air of the Drina valley, was the best in Bosnia, he said.* Everybody here lived to a ripe old age – unless they were killed in the mindless storms of war which, generation after generation, swept over them for unknowable reasons in far-away places.
Then, their lot was not peace and the quiet enjoyment of simple lives, but burnt houses and blood and the swift exodus to the hidden, traditional places in the caves and forests where father, and grandfather too, had hidden before. And then always the sly return when the madness had passed and the back-breaking job of rebuilding their houses, reclearing their land and replanting their crops.
It had happened to Ahmed three times in his seventy-seven years. First the Germans burnt his house in 1941, then the Partisans in 1943. Then, in 1992, Arkan came.† He had been the worst. He killed everything, father, son, mother, daughter, sheep, cats, dogs – nothing was left alive.
As Ahmed told his story, a small crowd of his neighbours materialised around us. One, Ŝemso from a neighbouring village, showed me the wound in his jaw where he had taken a bullet fleeing from Arkan’s troops as they had swept through the mountains to his village.
Ahmed told us many had died. Every house had been burnt. He had stayed behind with his son to try and defend their homes. They had held Arkan up for a couple of days, but his troops had heavy weapons, and the villagers only had only hunting rifles. In the end they had been forced to flee. He and his family had spent the war years in besieged Sarajevo.
But three years after the war ended he decided to try and return. At first they had just come back for the weekend, braving hostility from the local Serbs. Then, two years ago, they had received a tent from UNHCR, which they had put up alongside their burnt-out house and come back for good – except if the winter got really bad, when they returned to Sarajevo to stay with relatives until the better weather came.
At about 6 o’clock the skies suddenly opened, and it started to rain fiercely. We took shelter in a nearby empty house. Soon the rain changed to hailstones, which got progressively larger and larger until they were the size of a gob-stopper marbles, dancing in wild profusion on the grass and rattling cacophonously off the corrugated roof of a nearby shed. We watched as showers of unripe plums were knocked off the trees and Ahmed’s vegetables took a severe battering. After about twenty minutes it stopped, and we wandered out to inspect the damage.
To my horror I saw that the hailstones had gone right through the rotten fabric of Ahmed’s tent, in which Jane and I were to spend the night. The tent now looked as though a host of shotguns had been fired at it, and there were large puddles of mud where we were to sleep.
Ahmed and I decided to go off for a walk while the ground dried, picking our way along the mountainside on an old track, until we came to an ancient graveyard of stećaks* positioned on a prominent saddle overlooking the Drina valley. Ahmed told me that he thought that the stećaks were left by the Romans, but I told him that historians believe them to be from the time of the Bogomils, who were originally heretic Christians who had come to Bosnia in the thirteenth century.
He told me that there are other, older graves nearby and pointed out a collection of broken stone sarcophagi poking out of the ground about fifty metres away. These appeared, to my uneducated eye, to be much older, perhaps even Neolithic.
We then wandered back along the track, chatting about history, the ancient settlement of this land, of life, of war, of our children, of women and of plum harvests and the countryside. By the time we got back to the tent, a large fire had been lit and the sać† was steaming away on the fire, smelling delicious.
We all sat down under the gathering twilight, drank beer, ate lamb and chatted by the glow of the fire until it grew dark, and the stars came out, and the moon shone in a watery sky above us.
At around ten o’clock everyone started to drift off home.
It had been agreed that Jane and I should sleep in the tent, so Ahmed Sebiŝa went off to a neighbouring house, which had recently been rebuilt, while we settled down for the night.
Before we went to bed Ahmed told us to watch out for snakes. When they first moved back they had lived in a nearby stable and had been constantly plagued by snakes. Several had come in each night, and they used to hear them hissing and fighting with Ahmed’s dog (a stocky little terrier of uncertain breeding, but courageous as a lion. Ahmed said he had been out seeing off a wild boar which had come to forage in Ahmed’s vegetables the previous night). Neither of these stories was especially conducive to settling down for a good night’s sleep.
Nevertheless, dog tired, we fell asleep fairly quickly, lulled by the sounds of the night and the drip of the wet canvas above us.
The next morning we were up at 5.30 and washed at a tap fed from a nearby mountain stream. Everything damp and musty. This morning the clouds were lying in the valley below covering the Drina. But as the sun came up these gradually cleared to reveal an astonishing view down the valley, of the Drina sparkling in the early morning sunshine below us.
In due course we all gathered around the embers of last night’s fire, which Ahmet fanned into a roaring flame again and on which he soon had a pot of strong Bosnian coffee bubbling away, waiting for us. We all sat down, some ten of us, to a breakfast of cold lamb, kajmak* pura† and boiled eggs before saying our farewells and returning down the valley.
Jane’s emails recorded her own impression of other visits we made together to all the four corners of Bosnia during our years there and of some of her work with those who had suffered most. (On these visits out of Sarajevo, we were careful to ensure that we visited and stayed with families from all three of Bosnia’s communities, equally – although, coincidentally, all the descriptions quoted here relate to visits to Muslim families.)
11 Aug 2002
Paddy is well, in fact he surprises me as to how well he is, when you take how hard he works, the stress he is under, the pressure of the job, etc. He still loves the job, & the ordinary people seem to really appreciate him, too (though I don’t think you could include the politicians in that!). I really am very proud of what he has done here. It’s as if his whole life has been an apprenticeship for this job. On Friday P and I went to Srebrenica. I can’t describe it on ‘paper’, the story tells its own tale, but we went to all the sites, the football field where 1,500 men & boys were murdered, then to visit people who had returned, all women of course, except one village where we spent the night, where they are clearing the rubble of their destroyed homes. The women had lost husbands, sons, grandsons. It was extremely moving, and very humbling
XXXX
Jane
8 October 2002
Last week took us to some lovely, & not so lovely, places.
Tuesday started gloomy, with low cloud and rain – so no helicopter, which meant an early start driving to Vitez, which used to be a thriving steel town. The only thing the war seems to have done to its (Vitez’) advantage is that the air is now fresh, & there are fish in clean rivers, but no jobs & no thriving town any more.
Then to Tuzla, where we stayed in a hotel which was so cold I had to put on P’s socks. We visited a newly built centre where they try to
help traumatised women. Several Srebrenica women there. P is arranging that there will be a grave for each Srebrenica victim, even if no remains have been found, so that everyone has somewhere to mourn. To the cemetery next day to see the war memorial for all who died between 92 & 96. Over 2,000 names on a Vietnam-style marble memorial. Then a beautiful drive over the hills to Bijeljina, the trees are turning, and the countryside is spectacular. In Bijeljina we visited the hospital. I went to see the children’s ‘ward’, which was worse than some condemned buildings in the UK. The staff were wonderful, though – but only one bath (no shower) between all patients, parents & staff.
23 Oct 2003
The countryside looks superb. The trees are the most wonderful colours, seeming to turn from the tips first. We went off to Goražvde to make šlivović on Sunday. They (Muslims all) had this great machine, belching out steam & ‘slivo’ one end, being fed by water, wood & fermented plums at the other! Of course it was an excuse for a party. All the friends of this couple seem to bring round their fermented glop of plums, sit about, drink & eat, whilst this machine turns it into firewater.
16 March 2004
Must off. Have 10 women from an organization called ‘Women Victims of War’ for whom I am doing lunch at our house tomorrow, which I am dreading. All rape victims, some of even worse atrocities. I don’t know what I can do for them. I am told that it’s best just to listen. Seems good advice to me, but if I had those awful experiences, to go to lunch with this old granny in her posh house would only make me more angry. But I am told they want to come … so a quiche-making session ahead.
21 March 2004
My meeting with the Women Victims of War went much better than I could have wished. I was extremely nervous. There were 12 of them – 2 in their 20s, so they must have been in their teens when all this dreadfulness happened. One woman was raped 130 times, & another had 7 family members killed in front of her. How one can go on after that, I just don’t know. However, 1 of the young ones, in bright shocking pink, smiling throughout (well nearly), who gave me hope for them. She had a job in a plant nursery & therefore can see a future.
There are 1 or 2 things we can do immediately, like register their vehicle. It will cost 400 KM, but too much for them to find all at once. Also they have 7 women who are protected witnesses, but live in a flat without a telephone, which we can sort out for them.
21 July 2005
Just got back from Žepa. Another so called ‘safe haven’ which wasn’t. It is the most beautiful place, snug in a mountain valley, surrounded by mixed woodland. The weather was wonderful, but the life there isn’t. We stayed with some elderly refugees. The village has no employment, no school, no medical facilities, no senior school for the kids. The road in is so rough, no one wants to invest. All very sad in a place of such beauty.
I had many partners, national and international, without whose help I would have achieved nothing in Bosnia. But two require special mention. The first was the Bosniak Muslim state Prime Minister, Adnan Terzić. He is less devious than perhaps it is necessary to be in politics, especially in the Balkans, but he is a genuinely good man and a brave one. He was also one of the very few Bosnian politicians I knew who was motivated not by nationalism but by what was best for his country as a whole. The second was the President of the Serb-dominated Bosnian entity the Republika Srpska, Dragan Čavić, whose public acknowledgement of Serb involvement and shame in Srebrenica, involved an act of political courage of the same order as Willy Brandt’s statement of atonement at Auschwitz. To my deep regret and pain, both of these men, who were my partners and friends, and who took many personal risks to put their country on the road to a stable peace and the EU, paid with their political careers at the elections after I left. I hope it will not be too long before Bosnia will again recognise that what it needs is more such leaders, not fewer.
One of the policies I instituted when I arrived was to open all positions in the OHR, which had up to then been dominated by internationals, to Bosnians. They proved to be just as able, and in many cases more so, than the internationals who had been sent to Bosnia to do jobs that they could easily have done – with the added and priceless advantage that they knew the country and its customs and traditions. They were a wonderful team to work with, and I was very sorry indeed to have to part from them when my mandate was over.
Nevertheless (and despite their help), I made many mistakes too, of course. I probably devoted so much time to trying to persuade the Serbs that they could not be a state within a state that I may have overlooked the importance of the Croats. I cannot pretend, either, that every decision I made about the use of my powers to make things happen faster was wise, for some were not. Towards the end I probably got a little too impatient to get things done quickly. Indeed I did not realise just how frustrated and impatient I got in the last days of my mandate as I pushed forward the final reforms, especially to Bosnia’s fractured and politically dominated police forces. But Jane did. Here is her description of this time, in an email to a friend:
8 June 2005
Why is it that one goes through periods of one’s life when everything seems to turn to shit? We are passing through one of these periods. The Republika Srpska government have now turned down police reform, therefore shutting off the Bosnians’ path to Europe. The P. M. (Muslim) has just sacked the Foreign Minister (Serb), & Mostar have problems with this year’s budget [sic]. I have a husband in the deepest despair. Just to add to the sweetness & light, it has been raining since Sunday, with no sign of a let-up in the forecast until next Thursday!! Snow has been reported somewhere in Bosnia (can’t remember where, & I doubt I could spell it if I could!) Flaming June eh! And we have our first 2005 guests arriving this eve! Watch this space. Lots of love from us both,
Jane XXXXXXXXX
With hindsight, I think I should not have left Bosnia until this last great reform – the reform of Bosnia’s police force – was properly secured. To my regret, much of this has been allowed to unravel by the international community (and especially the EU). For this, I fear, Bosnia will pay heavily in the future.
And there were failures, too. The biggest was that Radovan Karadžić and Ratko Mladić remained at large when I left – despite a determined attempt to capture them that was conducted with my partners, the US Generals commanding the NATO force in Bosnia and the British General leading the European Union force (EUFOR) that took over in 2005. One look at Karadžić, when he was eventually captured, with that long beard and unkempt hair, confirmed to me what I suspected at the time, that he was almost certainly protected during many of his years as a fugitive, not by his ‘cover’ as a ‘doctor of alternative medicine’, but by being disguised as a monk in the Serbian Orthodox Church. I am delighted that he is now, at last, in The Hague – where, I am told, I may have to return for the fourth time, to give evidence at his trial.
But General Mladić, who is accused of having the blood of Srebrenica more directly on his hands, remains at liberty, protected in his case, I am sure, by renegade elements of the Serbian state security structures. There cannot be a stable peace in the western Balkans without justice in Bosnia, and justice will remain incomplete until these two primary architects of the Bosnian horrors both end up in The Hague where they belong.
Some things with which I was engaged in Bosnia were not strictly speaking part of my job, but being involved in them gave me a great sense of privilege, nevertheless. Perhaps none more so than leading the international fund-raising effort to establish the memorial graveyard with room for eight thousand Muslim men and boys at Srebrenica, opened by President Clinton on 20 September 2003. This beautiful and moving site with its thousands of simple white headstones,* built on the very spot where the Serbs gathered their victims before they were taken away to be murdered, will in time, I hope, become one of the world’s iconic symbols of remembrance and a testimony to what happens when the international community remains silent in the presence of great evil.
It was my involvement in
this project that brought me into contact with a little group of Bosniak Muslims who lived at a place called Sutjeska, in the mountains immediately above Srebrenica. When the Serbs stormed through in 1995 they all fled. But in 2002, on my first visit to the town, I heard that some had moved back and, with Jane, drove through the forest and along the vertiginous mountain tracks to find them. What we discovered when we got to Sutjeska was a small community of women led by one of the very few men to have escaped the massacre, called Hasib Huseinović. He had been the first to return, with his wife Fatima and his daughter Fadila. Jane and I were very moved by the courage of these women who had moved back into the area where they had lost husbands, sons, fathers and grandfathers and settled down to rebuild their burnt houses, clear their land and live amongst their Serb neighbours again. We both felt humbled by the fact that, faced with the same experiences, we would never have had the courage to do what they did. During our visit we discovered that they had some goats, but desperately needed a cow, for milk and cheese and for calves with which they could start a new herd. So we bought one and arranged for it to be sent to them. When we visited them a last time before leaving Bosnia, and Hasib ‘spun a lamb’† in our honour, we were delighted to find that our cow had had produced two daughters, and the little community was thriving. Jane’s email home tells it all:
1 April 2004
We had a great trip to Srebrenica. We went to the village we first visited when we first got here. They now have another 15 odd houses rebuilt, with animals, ducks, chickens, dogs, & of course, the cow we gave them last time is pregnant again, they also have another calf too. So slowly, slowly and step by painful step. Best of all was the young girl who had lost all her brothers & Father, and then her Mother died of a broken heart. She now has a new house, was working out in the fields, & ran towards us, grinning from ear to ear. They have a huge green house, & electricity at last. There were tears, of course, but of joy this time.
A Fortunate Life Page 47