Old Yugoslavia Rediscovers Itself on Stage Bosnia, Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia renew friendships

Old Yugoslavia Rediscovers Itself on Stage

Yugoslavia may be dead and gone as a political construct - but as a cultural space it has never been more alive.

Andrej Klemencic

Only a decade ago the theatre ensembles of the former Yugoslavia were scarcely on speaking terms – the legacy of grim years of warfare between Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo.
Fast forward to today and actors and directors from once war-estranged countries not only talk to one another but hug and cry at theatre festivals.
There is a newfound confidence about tackling the issue of the region’s wars - together.
In the 1990s, the conflict was not ignored. But it was either addressed in highly brutal terms in films such as Srdjan Dragojevic’s Pretty Village, Pretty Flame or Wounds, or addressed with excessive delicacy, examples of this being the plays of Dusan Jovanovic.
In his trilogy from mid 1990’s , the then still ongoing war merely sneaked into  Greek tragedy, reminding only the most sensitive audience members of what was going on just miles away.
This year’s Bitef theatre festival in Belgrade brought together hundreds of actors, directors, writers and producers from throughout the former Yugoslavia, raising hopes of a renaissance of a common Yugoslav cultural space and of a marked rise in joint, cross-border productions. Many say it is the only way theatre and film can hope to survive.
Kokan Mladenovic, director of Belgrade’s Atelje 212 theatre, believes productions made within a single country have no future.

Kokan Mladenović

“I’m convinced that in years to come there won’t be a single significant theatre production that won’t be a co-production between at least two former Yugoslav republics,” he says.
“Music, films and TV series have taught us that a common market makes sense. Today you can’t make a film or series counting only on viewers from one country.”
Mladenovic’s own theatre has been in the forefront of the new wave of productions tackling Yugoslav themes head-on.
Its 2010/2011 programme features a season provocatively entitled “NEXT YU”.
“Everyone can say ‘Ex-Yu’, but very few dare say ‘Next-Yu’,” Mladenovic jests.
“But the feedback we got from the season shows that the idea of Yugoslavia is very much alive,” he continues.
“People in the theatre world feel claustrophobic, stuck in these cultural provinces created by the break-apart [of the old state],” he explains.
“In these mini-markets everyone is big and everyone can easily get awards. That’s not quality.”
Theatre scholar and Bitef programme manager Jovan Cirilov agrees heartily.
“Right-wingers will always oppose such friendships and creativity … [but] such opponents care little about culture as such,” he maintains. “What they don’t want to do is relinquish their feuds.”

Jovan Cirilov

Cirilov believes passionately in the continued necessity of a shared theatre “space” between the nations of former Yugoslavia, noting that a “continuity of theatre expression has survived in these countries despite the harshest conditions imaginable.”
He takes pride in the fact that seven of the nine regional shows at this year’s Bitef were co-productions between at least two former Yugoslav republics.
“Yugoslavia exists, not as a nostalgic term, but in terms of cultural cooperation between the South Slavic nations,” Cirilov adds.
Dramatist Borka Pavicevic of the Belgrade Centre for Cultural Decontamination, which has held many events on Yugoslav topics, says these issues need to be addressed openly.
“First, there is no such thing as Ex-Yugoslavia, just as there is no Ex-Austria-Hungary,” she opines.
Pavicevic says theatre must mirror reality and work hand in hand with democratic processes in the region.
“Critical thought is something that can bring democracy to these lands,” she maintains. “First to each country individually, then to all of us together.”
But not everyone is ready to hear the new message, according to Boris Lijesevic, director of Bitef's Grand Prix winner, the Sarajevo-Belgrade co-production Elijahova stolica [“Elijah's Chair”].
Prior to Bitef the show received “not a single written review in Serbia,” the director notes. “Until Bitef, our production was not invited to a single festival in Serbia. This was the first time.”
Elijah's Chair is about a man from Vienna who on his 50th birthday discovers that his father was not a Nazi officer, as he had thought, but a Jew from Sarajevo.
He goes to Sarajevo at the height of the siege in 1992, looking for his father. The show features a monologue by female lead Alma, played by Maja Izetbegovic, who speaks directly to the audience about the city’s suffering under the Bosnian Serb siege.
“When we see how people in Serbia react to this, it is clear that this piece is addressing a topic that hasn’t been tackled in the country for 20 years,” Lijesevic says. “But one of the key conditions for regional re-integration to happen is to speak about these things.”
A 2006  Bosnian film, Grbavica, about raped women from the Serb-held sector of Sarajevo, saw no regular theatre distribution in Serbia, he continues.
“Some people don’t want other people to see it. That kind of thing just makes me want to deal even more with regional, Yugoslav topics,” Lijesevic concludes.
Serbia is not alone in stopping its ears to uncomfortable, disturbing reminders of the recent past.
According to Atelje 212’s Mladenovic, the Croatian embassy in Belgrade first said it would help with - but then pulled out of - a production of Gospoda Glembajevi [“The Glembays”] by the famous Croatian writer Miroslav Krleza.
“That production was the highlight of the NEXT YU season. The embassy initially said it would contribute but then dropped the project once they learned that it was going to be part of a season with a title like that,” he says.
In the old Yugoslavia, there was an unspoken arrangement between the theatres of Belgrade, Zagreb and Ljubljana whereby the capital dealt with avant-garde and large productions, Zagreb handled more classical topics and Ljubljana staged experimental theatre.
Today those dividing lines have gone, as each country has had to develop these parallels within its own theatre space.
While most of the region's significant actors and directors still come from those three cities, writers from Bosnia have come to the fore because of their direct experience of the war - that being the most relevant topic that Yugoslav theatre can offer to a foreign viewer.
Igor Stiks, Sarajevo-born author of Elijah's Chair, on which the play is based, says regional authors sometimes face a challenge of being locked into writing about war themes alone.

igor Stiks

“Some authors have chosen to deal with that single topic,” he notes, “but I hope it will be possible for me to include topics from my ten years of life spent abroad.
“Elijah’s Chair is not just a novel about the war in Sarajevo and not just a novel about the consequences of the Yugoslav wars,” he explains.
“What I wanted to achieve is for a German or a French reader to understand that this war happened to them, too, not just to some exotic tribes of the Balkans.”
Sarajevo actor Maja Izetbegovic, the lead in Elijah's Chair, is aware of the risk of being typecast in war-related pieces but believes such plays are still needed for healing processes to take place.
“I’m emotionally drained after playing these shows. I often say to myself: ‘Enough,’” she says.
“When will we stop talking about the war, the break-up and the transition?” she asks. “But such are the times we still live in, and we have to address the issues of our time.”
While Sarajevo stood on the margins of the Yugoslav theatre world, lacking an established tradition of its own, Slovenia was on another kind of margin, culturally at a distance from the rest of Yugoslavia.
This was not only because of its Austro-Hungarian heritage – shared with Croatia – but because Slovenes played little part in the Balkan conflicts of the past centuries.
Slovene director Dusan Jovanovic, one of the key theatre figures of former Yugoslavia, agrees that Slovenia’s culture scene sees Yugoslav matters through different lenses, and so sees renewed cultural cooperation outside of any political context.
“Slovenia's story was somewhat different to that of [the rest of] Yugoslavia,” he recalls. “That’s why it was perhaps easier for Slovenia to break ties to the other former republics.
“But things have changed now. I do not see this as some kind of re-Yugoslav-ization, because that expression would have political connotations and such connotations are absurd now.
“From the wreckage of the former country we have now many new countries, each of which has its own perspective.
“For a long time Slovenia refused to make tight cultural bonds to the rest of the region but in the last ten years, this has changed.”
He dates the beginning of this new era of cooperation back to the 2000 visit to Belgrade of the Drama Ljubljana, which then continued in a series of exchanges.
“Intellectual and theatre bonds have become very vibrant, which stimulates Slovenian theatre,” he concludes.
Actor Dragica Potocnjak, from the Slovensko mladinsko gledalisce [Slovene Youth theatre] of Ljubljana, which presented “Damned Be the Traitor of his Homeland” [a verse from the old Yugoslav national anthem) at this year’s Bitef, says she contemplated leaving the stage for good when the country fell apart.
“It felt wrong that someone was narrowing down our creative and living space. At that time I lost my faith in theatre and I wanted to end my career,” she recalls.
She is not the only Slovene actor yearning for a broader stage. Primoz Bezjak, who acts in the same play, says he wishes he could emulate colleagues from days of  Yugoslavia “who’ve shot films and had an opportunity to perform on a regular basis on stage in all the republics  of Yugoslavia”.

Remains of American WWII vet shot down over Hercigovina being repatriated from Bosnia

Vinko Pehar, grandson of the man who buried Staff Sgt. Meceslaus T. Miaskiewicz, shows members of a visiting U.S. military team some of the wreckage left behind from a B-17 that was shot down in 1944 in the village of Stubica, Bosnia-Herzegovina. On Sept. 27, 2011, the remains will be handed over to the U.S. during a ceremony in Sarajevo.

Courtesy of the U.S. Defense Attaches Office

U.S. officials learned this summer about the rocky hillside grave where Staff Sgt. Meceslaus T. Miaskiewicz was buried nearly 70 years ago. It was thought that Misaskiewicz?s remains were collected in 1947 along with seven other crewmembers who died in the crash. While the circumstances are unclear, U.S. officials suspect that a language barrier between U.S. officials and village residents at the time was the reason for the mix-up. Miaskiewicz's remains are being transferred to the States.

Courtesy of the U.S. Defense Attaché's Office

STUTTGART, Germany — For 67 years, the only people who knew about the presence of the American were the residents of the village in western Bosnia-Herzegovina where he was buried.
In 1944, a resident of the hamlet of Stubica buried Staff Sgt. Meceslaus T. Miaskiewicz, a Massachusetts native who was shot down over the former Yugoslavia, according to U.S. military officials who interviewed local residents.
It had long been assumed that Miaskiewicz’s remains had been collected by the military along with the crash’s other seven victims soon after the war, but U.S. military members learned this summer that was not the case. Somehow, Miaskiewicz was left behind.
On Tuesday, Miaskiewicz’s flag-draped coffin will be loaded onto a U.S. C-130 in Sarajevo, the first leg of a journey home to relatives in Massachusetts. After a stop at Ramstein Air Base in Germany, his coffin will be flown to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, where he will receive the same honor guard reception as troops killed in combat in Afghanistan and Iraq.
“He deserves to go home,” said Master Sgt. Markanthony Cuneta, a member of the 10-person U.S. European Command team that will serve as a color guard and pallbearers during the repatriation. “This is a big thing for everyone. It’s a chance to serve someone who served before us.”
It is estimated that the remains of 6,600 troops who fought in Europe during World War II are still recoverable, said Capt. Brian Fariss, the mortuary affairs officer at EUCOM.
However, Miaskiewicz’s name wasn’t on any “missing” list. Remains thought to be his had long ago been buried at the National Cemetery on Long Island, N.Y.
Miaskiewicz’s unmarked grave in Bosnia-Herzegovina came to light in July when officials in the town of Ljubuski, southwest of Mostar, sent a letter to the U.S. Embassy in Sarajevo. In the course of searching for their missing dead, town leaders learned the story of the American buried in Stubica, a nearby hamlet. After an excavation of the rocky gravesite, local officials reported what they found to the embassy. The letter included a photo of a dog tag with Miaskiewicz’s name.
U.S. officials started searching online for clues about the American soldier, according to military officials in Sarajevo. That search led them to an online World War II history newsletter called “The Motor Pool Messenger,” which included a detailed account of the crash and crewmembers aboard the B-17, called “Daisy Mae.”
Meanwhile, EUCOM dispatched to Stubica a team of investigators, who were guided to the gravesite by Vinko Pehar, grandson of the man who buried Miaskiewicz. They took pictures, collected DNA samples and talked with residents, all of whom seemed to know the story of the American buried on the hillside, according to the U.S. defense attaché’s office in Sarajevo.
“To see how (the story) has been passed down to the generations was fascinating,” said Lt. Col. Scott Schenking, the U.S. Army attaché in Sarajevo, who made the trip to Stubica.
The crash happened in May of 1944 when members of the 347th Bomb Squadron were returning from an aborted mission to bomb oil fields in Ploiesti, Romania.
On the return trip to Italy, the formation flew into heavy enemy anti-aircraft fire over Yugoslavia. The “Daisy Mae,” flying at 16,000 feet and in sight of the Adriatic Sea, had its nose section blown off, according to the attaché’s office. Though three members of the crew ejected to safety, Miaskiewicz, a gunner, and the rest of the team didn’t survive the fiery crash.
“The grave site was up on the side of a hill, about 500 meters from where the plane landed,” said Schenking.
Only bits of the plane remain, such as pieces of an old machine gun that was used to prop up a fence in one villager’s vineyard. At the time of the crash, villagers as well as the Germans collected whatever scrap metal they could, Schenking said.
During their visits to Stubica, Schenking and the others met with villagers, some of whom were children at the time of the crash.
One woman, who was 12 at the time, recalled in great detail the sound of the crash and burning bodies as they hit the ground.
“You could tell this made a dramatic impression on her,” Schenking said.
Residents also shared stories of their own missing family members, from World War II, those who disappeared during the Tito era and the wars of the 1990s that tore apart Yugoslavia.
“They all expressed how much they understood and appreciated that the Americans would take so much time and effort to identify their own,” Schenking said.

Bosnia needs to not give up on Nihad Dedovic's little brother Nedim! Spain looms in his future!

Nedim Dedovic ('97), brother of Lottomatica player Nihad, can be the next foreign player to become Spanish citizen. The steps to have a new passport already started, so it won't be difficult see him wearing Spanish jersey next years. Dedovic, playing currently for FC Barcelona, was named this week-end the best scorer of the U16 Tordera tournament, in Spain.

It appears that another young Bosnian talent has been lost to another country abroad. It seems Spain has taken up were Slovenia left off, in the market of expropriating Bosnian talent for their own use. First Nedzad Sinanovic rejected Bosnians call to the National Team after getting his Spanish passport, now it seems they are attacking the Bosnian youth system as if they have declared war on BiH itself. Nedim Dedovic is a better pure shooter than his older brother and may prove out to be a better talent. He has been in Spain already for years honing his game, even though he is just 14 years old and came over with his brother a couple of years ago. Already accumulating MVP trophies and showing himself to be some of the best talent of his generation in the world. His game is already showing some polish for such a young player. This is were a real organization, KSBiH run by professional basketball administration and coaching would help sway the youth of Bosnia to remain in the country. If Teoman Alibegovic, Gordan Firic, Nenad Markovic, Svetislav Pesic or Bogdan Tanjevic were running KSBiH I think the response of players would be much different. The officials who run KSBiH and the youth system are arrogant and incompetent, don't they realise the difference between having Nedim Dedovic, Sandro Gacic, Adnan Omeragic could be the difference between being the best in Europe and also rans just hoping to get into Eurobasket and winning a game. Bosnia could be one of the top teams in Europe (top 6 easily) and should compete for an Olympic birth every time. If Macedonia showed anything it should be how an organization can rise above individual talent with just a couple of quality players but with solid coaching and organization.

Bosnia faces not only the loss of Nedim Dedovic but also the giant talent of Sandro Gacic who so far has rebuffed the calls from Spain to join there country. Adnan Omeragic has also agreed to join the Spanish teams and the loss of the 6'8" young talent is a big loss for BiH. If Bosnia isn't organized properly it could lose Sandro as well in time.  Along with these three are a couple of quality talent in the US high school and Canadian school systems. All together they could form a golden generation of Bosnian basketball but it seems that it will be lost, like so many other opportunities in BiH.

Spain is building an amazing pipeline to the Balkans getting players like Nikola Mirotic who has lottery pick talent and was a first round pick of the Chicago Bulls leading them into the future. As well as these great young Bosnian talents, you can't fault them for exploiting the weakness inherant in Bosnian basketball. If these players weren't getting exploited by Spain these Bosnian officials would be doing the same thing. They don't deserve these level of talents, let alone lead the Bosnian National Team. It is offensive to have these represenitives of BiH who in reality serve as the arm of Serbia and Beobasket get the oppertunity to lead the team. It is time for change in BiH in the structure and leadership the team and country currently enjoys. Everytime you wonder what the leadership of KSBiH is, remember that Milan Milosevic represented the National Team in Eurobasket this year, even though he hasn't held a job with a team for a full season since leaving Bosnia years ago. He does have the one connection that does matter though, he is represented by Serbia, Beobasket and Raznatovic.

5 NUNS ATTACKED AND KILLED BY CHETNIKS IN WW2 BEATIFIED IN SARAJEVO BOSNIA CEREMONY

A Catholic sister looks on during a ceremony of beatification of five catholic nuns brutally murdered during World War II. in Sarajevo, Bosnia, on Saturday, Sept. 24, 2011. After decades of investigation and proof gathering, sisters of the order of "Daughters of the Love of God": Marija Jula Ivanisevic of Croatia, Marija Berchmana Leidenix of Austria, Marija Krizina Bojanc of Slovenia, Marija Antonija Fabjan of Slovenia and Marija Bernadeta Banja of Croatia were bona fide by a decree of Pope Benedict XVI. In 1942, the five nuns were taken away from their monastery in Pale near Sarajevo, the monastery was burned and they were imprisoned and tortured by Bosnian Serb paramilitary forces until they were killed in prison in Eastern Bosnian town of Gorazde, later that year.

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) — Five nuns who died in the custody of Serb extremists during World War II have been beatified at a ceremony that attracted thousands in Bosnia — the last formal step before possible sainthood.

Jula Ivanisevic, Berchmana Leidenix, Krizina Bojanc, Antonija Fabjan and Bernadeta Banja helped the poor regardless of religion in the majority Serb village of Pale. Serb soldiers burned their convent in late 1941.

The nuns were held in military barracks near the east Bosnian town of Gorazde. The soldiers beat and tried to rape them. The women jumped out of the second-floor windows, and soldiers later stabbed to death those still alive.

Pope Benedict XVI sent Cardinal Angelo Amato from the Vatican to lead Saturday's ceremony in Sarajevo. Up to 20,000 people attended.

Bosnia: Haris Silajdzic to save the state of BiH

SARAJEVO, September 18 (FENA) – Situation cannot be more difficult than it already is in BiH. It is about to lose its statehood and I can only talk about causes which led to that situation and possible measures to save what is left to be saved, president of Party for BiH (SBIH) Haris Silajdzic stated yesterday at the beginning of Congress of the political party which was held in Sarajevo.
Silajdzic finds that anti-Bosnian forces have been present more lately so citizens are in position to write petitions or send appeals for preservation of statehood of BiH.

He especially emphasized that political, not legal interpretation of Dayton Treaty has led to the current political image in BiH and he asked international community to solve "unclear" issues in BiH because as he said Dayton Treaty is an international document.

"We want to stop scattering of BiH and we want to take part in preservation of its statehood. BiH is a mini model of pluralism and globalization and why destroy that model in Europe. Pluralism brings quality and our task is plural BiH“, Silajdzic said.

President of SBiH Haris Silajdzic and also candidate at this congress for president in the next mandate period emphasized that BiH along politics has to pay attention to economy, especially energy facilities.

There were around 520 delegates in Sarajevo Youth Center Skenderija at congress of SBiH.

War members of Presidency of BiH Stjepan Kljuic, Miro Lazovic and Secretary General of VKBI and Circle 99, Emir Zlatar and Adil Kulenovic addressed delegates of the congress and wished them successful work and supported SBiH in preservation of integral BiH.

Bosnia: Karadzic trial: Father testifies about his rape, son and daughters rapes at the hands of the Serbs in Rogatica

Radovan Karadzic in the courtroom

Protected witness KDZ 051 described at the trial of Radovan Karadzic the ordeal of a parent whose seven-and-a-half year old daughter and 13-year old son were raped by the Serb forces in Rogatica in 1992. The witness, himself a rape victim, said he was still haunted by the thought that the men he knew, his former friends and neighbors, committed the crimes

‘They raped me too, but somehow I got through it. But when it came to my kids, it is difficult to come to terms with it’, protected witness KDZ 051 said at the trial of Radovan Karadzic. The prosecutor asked the witness about the consequences he and his family felt following their ordeal during the detention in Rogatica in 1992. ‘My seven-and-a-half-year old daughter was raped several times and my son, who was 13 at the time, was raped for months and that hurts the most,’ the witness responded. As the witness said, he is still haunted by the thought that those who committed the crime were the people he knew, his former friends and neighbors.
Speaking about his Calvary, the witness said that before the war Rogatica was a small town full of life, where people were on good terms. There were many mixed marriages. People celebrated Muslim, Catholic and Orthodox holidays. Life was good. This good life was ended in blood when the Serb army and Rajko Kusic’s Chetniks came. Rogatica was first brutally shelled for three months from the local hills. The Serb forces then entered the town and ‘cleansed’ it ruthlessly, not caring if their victims were children, invalids or the sick.
The witness and his family were detained for three and a half months in a local school building and about ten months at another location in Rogatica. Their ordeal left them deeply traumatized. ‘I got seriously ill. I have been in treatment for the past 16 years and I have tried to forget at least some of it, but I can’t. To this day I haven’t asked my wife if she was raped, too. I lack strength to do it’, the witness said and started crying. This marked the end of the examination-in chief and the judges ordered a break to allow the witness to compose himself and prepare for Radovan Karadzic’s cross-examination.
In his cross-examination Karadzic tried to prove that the forces under Kusic’s control didn’t shell Rogatica ‘for no reason’. According to Karadzic, they did it because Muslims from Rogatica ‘offered resistance’. Karadzic brought up Kusic’s combat reports stating that residents of the villages around Rogatica had come into town seeking shelter and were put up in the local high school building for their own safety. The witness said this was not true: this was not what he saw and experienced. The witness insisted that the civilians had not come in on their own: they were ‘arrested’ and taken to the school as prisoners.
When Karadzic put it to the witness that the OTP investigators wrote some paragraphs in his statement the witness called the claim ‘insulting’. He insisted no one ever told him what to say. The witness told Karadzic he didn’t hate him: the only reason why he came to The Hague was to recount his ordeal. Karadzic asked the witness if he had reported the crime against him and his family to the Serb authorities. The witness responded it was not necessary as everyone knew about it, including the police leadership and the commands of the Serb and Chetnik forces. Many of them took part in the crimes and sadly ruined their reputations, the witness said.

How KK BOSNA ASA can rebuild it's team and it's reputation

KK BOSNA ASA once the shining star of Yugoslavian basketball continues to fall on hard times. Once on equal if not superior footing of Partizan, Cibona and Union Olympia, KK BOSNA ASA now has more in common to Sibenek and if they do not change soon could end up a relic relegated to the history books. KK BOSNA is in bad financial shape, can barely afford to field a team this year after years of mismanagement and owes millions from old contracts. They tried to build a team last year with castoffs and retreads and "prospects" who either were in there mid 20's or had little to no talent at all. The disaster than unfolded resulted in a 2-8 league final tournament record.

This year they have shed all of the players from last years team and have so far only signed two new ones Edin Alispahic, who was a nice young prospect a few year ago before a serious knee injury limited his potential and Sven Smajlagic who looks most similar in style to Danko Delibasic (a player no one would confuse with his father) or Marko Batina both players who don't inspire a lot of confidence in the direction of the team. Besides Sven is 21 and Edin is 23 hardly young prospects in the context of what you would expect to see out of players who should have a lot of development left.

All of the major Bosnian teams KK Celik, KK Sloboda, KK Bosna and even the up and coming KK Triland are having major funding issues. On one end of the scale is are teams like Celik and Triland who's ROI (return on investment) is very high, the teams have spent there revenue well, it's just that the influx of capitol isn't high enough to offset the costs of doing business. On the other end of the spectrum is KK Bosna and KK Sloboda which are at least 5 million KM in debt through the signing of big, bad contracts over the years. It is hard to imagine they will be able to extract themselves from this mess anytime soon.

More than anything they need a comprehensive, top to bottom business model of how to run a franchise with substantive value.

Administration: The leadership of Nihad Imamovic has been a dismal failure, the "partnership" between KK BOSNA and Beobasket Belgrade and the "esteemed" Raznatovic has been a one sided failure. Bosnia has recieved a lot of inferior talent with big price tags in the last few years. Also the fact that Bosna has brought in internationals, paid a hefty fee to agents to sign them and then replace them with another high priced import has been a spectacular failure. These agents have been able to secure multipule payment from Bosna for bringing in guys like Quemont Greer, Clearance Gilbert and Stanley Burrell. KK Bosna needs leadership with patience, vision and communication abilities to raise the transparency in the team and to show and communicate it's vision. It needs to model itself on a smaller, less well funded version of Partizan.

Marketing: KK Bosna needs to be able to communicate to it's rabid fan base that this rebuilding is done with vision for championships in the future and you need to come seem the amazing young talent as it proves itself on the international basketball scene. It also needs to ensure that it's members are highly visible in it's community and in ex pat Bosnian communities around the globe, remember a lot of these people come to Bosnia and have a much larger disposable income. You could even eventually sponsor a US summer league youth team. Also much like Partizan has done, after a couple of years travel to these communities and put on exhibition games. Using social media with the players to run a KK BOSNA blog, twitter (filtered and approved through the team) and Facebook and foursquare to raise the visibility of the team.

Merchandising: There is a demand for merchandise and uniforms but it is hard to find or come by. I have seen KK BOSNA jersys go for good money on ebay. When have been in Sarajevo it is nearly impossible to find a KK Bosna uniform.  They often don't even have much to offer at there games. If you go to there office on Hamze Hume you will be lucky if they even answer there door. Swag is a very important and so is information. a KK BOSNA yearly magazine in Bosnian and English and available around the globe would be a good move. So would drawing on it's rich history, opening a museum to it's history eventually and allowing the naming rights to be used in beer sales, restaurants etc are options for the future as well.

Coaching: Bosna has run through coaches the last few years from the very good like Juri Zdovic, Nenad Markovic to the bad like Mensud Bajramovic some seasons changing coaches 3x in a year! What Bosna needs to do, like everything else is identify a coach with a vision, passion and knowledge to develop a roster that is talented and hardworking and not beholden to outside interests.

Development: Bosna's development of young players has been abysmal the last few years. Outside of Nihad Dedovic (which a blind man could see his talents as a 15 year old kid) the team has missed on all of their big time talents going back to Predrag Saporac and the postwar years. Bosna hasn't been willing to sign legit young talent  or develop them properly through weight training, coaching, teaching and playing time. Often players play out of position and don't have the opportunity to get minutes until they are 20-22 years old. Young talent in Europe are now seeing regular rotation time on good teams yet Bosna continues to forsake the opportunities. Not only that but youngsters like Mirza Saralija have come and taken a step back by joining the team, a disaster for the franchise.

Vision: KK BOSNA ASA is a small market team, Sarajevo is a mid size city of about 500,000 and ticket revenue is minimal at about $5 a ticket even with sellouts close to 7,000 when the team is in international play and playing at a high level.  What they need is a road map and a blueprint to success, they need to follow what Partizan has done, just on a smaller scale. Partizan is the model team in Europe with a budget of about 5 million a year (about 1/4 of the teams they compete with in Europe) yet are a consistent Euroleague team that competes for the finals every year. They sign some of the best internationals and do a great job developing their own talent which form the core of their team. KK Bosna through proper development of revenue streams and marketing could operate with a budget in the 2.5 million to 3 million range if done properly.

Import players: Bosna needs to limit the use of international players, look for less expensive, less well known ones that have a work ethic and understanding of what they are getting into before they arrive. Terrell Castle is the perfect example of what you can do with a small budget and a unknown talent when used properly.

Domestic players: The team needs to build around youth but have a couple of veterans who can lead the team and show them what it means to be a professional. Players like Samir Leric, Abdurahman Kharimanovic or even a lesser known talent like Ramiz Suljanovic or Selmir Husanovic. Emir Guzonjic is a nice role player who has some similarities to Dzenen Rahimic but costs significantly less.

Young players: The team needs to develop through it's own system but also look to bring in talent like Adnan Vrabac. Adis Zahiragic displayed great range and high level shooting abililty but just needs coaching and development to become a Euroleague quality PG. Nedim Buza displayed great talent as well this summer and these are players the teams needs to develop. How much will they ever get out of Ernad Mujic or Nermin Buza? Neither has the talent to be top tier European talent so stop wasting minutes on them or players like Dino Hodzic, when the focus should be on younger players. These three can be decent role players  but need to not be the focus of the future when that future isn't possible. I would rather the team pay five young talents and a shooting coach or a post position coach, rather than one import player of suspicious quality.

Transfers: If your going to allow transfers of players your going to lose anyway in a year or two, but are under contract the best option is what Japanese baseball does, charge a posting fee, make the bidding anonymous and open the process to the highest bid submitted and then they have the rights to negotiate with that player. If KK BOSNA was the best team in Bosnia to get minutes, coaching and advance your professional career you can bet eventually players like Stanko Barac, Bojan Bogdanovic and others would be attracted to come to Sarajevo if it was in there best financial and professional interest. The key is attracting not only the best Bosniak talent but Bosnian Serb and Croat talent as well. Bosnian Croats produce a ton of legit talent for such a small portion of the population (less than 400,000 total in the country).

Long term outlook: What KK BOSNA and all KSBiH teams need is private ownership, you could even make it similar to what the Green Bay Packers do and have them publicly owned but with fans owning the team. There is no real incentive or transparency in the operations of the teams and you can clearly see the results in the shambles that Celik, Sloboda and Bosna now find themselves.

Norwegian Film Revives Srebrenica Genocide Row divides ex-Yugoslavia communities once again

“Imagine that a new documentary claimed the Jews were not gassed in Auschwitz and had brought it all upon themselves. I wonder if Swedish television would have broadcast a documentary like that.”
So says Armin Hadzic, a founder of a group on Facebook that is protesting against Swedish TV’s decision to air a programme called A town Betrayed on August 28.
In only a few weeks the group has gathered 13,000 members.
In an interview on April 26 with the Norwegian newspaper Dagsavisen, the director, Ole Flyum, outlined his controversial views about the events in 1995 in the eastern Bosnian town of Srebrenica - views that set him sharply at odds with Bosniaks [Muslims], some of whom call him a genocide denier.
"Many think of Srebrenica as a new Holocaust in Europe in which 8,000 people were massacred. In reality it was part of extensive military actions,” Flyum told the newspaper. “It appears to us an extremely chaotic situation, and not as planned ethnic cleansing.”
The documentary further claims that Srebrenica was effectively handed to the Bosnian Serb army as a part of a deal between Bosnia’s former president, Alija Izetbegovic, and the US government led by President Bill Clinton.
The film also suggests that Bosnian Serbs committed atrocities in response to atrocities committed first by the Bosniak-run Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Hadzic's Facebook group describes the documentary as a deliberate attempt to falsify history and he claims it violates basic principles of journalism.
“I don’t understand how they could show this documentary. They don’t have any respect for the victims,” he said.
When the film was first shown in Norway in April, the country’s Helsinki Committee sent a complaint to the Norwegian Press Complaints Commission and the Norwegian Broadcasting Council.


Flyum and the film’s editor, Vibeke Haug, said in an answering letter to the Norwegian Press Complaints Commission, dated August 23, that the documentary was the result of four years of serious research by American, Norwegian and Bosnian experts.
“We accept none of the criticisms levelled against our programme by the Norwegian Helsinki Committee,” the letter said.
“It seems to us that NHC is complaining about a documentary that we never made.”
One of the main witnesses in the film, the former mayor of Srebrenica, Hakija Meholjic, does indeed claim that Srebrenica was effectively sacrificed to the Serbs as part of a deal hatched between presidents Clinton and Izetbegovic.

Meholjic has recently gone public in the Bosnian media to make it clear that he stands behind all of his statements made in the movie.

While most Bosniak expatriates in Scandinavia deplore the film, many Serbs living in Scandinavia take the opposite view. They have organized their own Facebook group, called “Truth for all”, which currently has more than 16,000 members.

The founders of this group say they formed it “to support freedom of speech in Sweden, which is now being seriously threatened by the intimidating pressure on the Swedish Broadcasting Service”.

On the group’s pages, members express anger about the media’s portrayal of Bosnian Serbs and gratitude to the Norwegian directors of the movie for portraying Serbs also as victims of the war.

One of the creators of the pro-Serbian Facebook group denied that the film about Srebrenica had stirred up old animosities among ex-Yugoslav communities in Scandinavia.

“It’s not the documentary that has created tensions but rather the way that the media, and in particular the Swedish media, has consequently portrayed only one side of the story about the conflict in Bosnia,” he said.

“Against such a background, it is controversial to talk about Serbian victims, and even more controversial to show them on TV.

“The Serbs are supposed to silently accept their role as the guilty party in order to be accepted,” he added.

Hadzic denies wishing to suppress any particular point of view, saying all the facts should be out in the open and that this applies also to all victims, whether they were Croats, Serbs or Bosniaks.



“I am just sorry that people cannot relate to mere facts,” he says.  “This documentary denies the fact that genocide took place in Srebrenica and is based on material rejected by the Hague Tribunal.”
The International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia, ICTY, in the 2001 trial of Radislav Krstic, ruled that genocide had occurred place in Bosnia in the 1990's.

Kjell Magnusson, director of the Uppsala Programme for Holocaust and Genocide Studies from 2005 till 2006, argues that discussion about the definition of genocide does not necessarily imply denial that one took place.

“The problem with today’s debate when it comes to Srebrenica and the topic of genocide is that it has become a very emotional political symbol for Bosniak victims,” Magnusson told Balkan Insight.

He says that the ICTY went against the principles of the UN Genocide Convention in its 2001 ruling, by applying a new definition, “local genocide”, for what happened in the town of Srebrenica.
“For some, any critical assessment of the definition and usage of the term ‘genocide’ places you in a position of a ‘denier’,” he added.
The complaint by the Norwegian Helsinki Committee is expected to be processed on the October 20, the Norwegian Press Complaints Commission told Balkan Insight.

Bosnia movie "Belvedere" is a Oscar canidate directed by Ahmed Imamovic

 

The Ahmed Imamovic directed movie  „Belvedere“ is the BH candidate for the Oscar, the BH film workers association announced.

The BH film workers association has been proposing candidates to the American academy for the category of “Best foreign movie” for the last 11 years .

In 2001 the Danis Tanovic movie “Nobody's land” was nominated, and won the Oscar for best foreign movie in March 2002.

Bosnia and Hercigovina tourism: Muslibegović house in Mostar- one of the ten best hotels in the world

 

Muslibegovic house is a Bosnian national monument located in Mostar.

It is one of the most valuable architectonic treasures, and is 300 year old. This hotel is a living symbol of the continuity of Bosnian history and culture.

National Monument - Muslibegovic house has 10 luxury rooms and apartments, which are beautifully decorated with huge care for the advancement of the natural beauty of the museum. 

The most famous web page for room reservations has released a list of the best hotels for 2010. One of the ten best hotels in the world was “Muselbegovic house” in Mostar, an architectonic treasure from the 17th century.

HISTORY

The Muslibegovics represent a noble lineage in Hercegovina, a where its members were governors for many centuries.  Members of this noble family establish themselves in Mostar at the end of the 17th century following the fall of  Herceg-Novi the to the Venetians in 1687.

At that time, the Muslibegovic is owned property all over Herzegovinia (the southern portion of today's Bosnia Hercegovina) and continue to exert substantial influence over social and political affairs in the region.

Bosnian Srebrenica survivor testifies in trial of Zdravko Tolimir

Zdravko Tolimir in the courtroom

Zdravko Tolimir. He has talked about the events in July 1995 after the Bosnian Serb troops overran the Srebrenica enclave; he was 16 years old at the time and lived in Srebrenica with his parents, brother and sister

A protected witness, PW 14, testifies at the trial of Zdravko Tolimir via video link. The witness confirmed that the evidence he gave at the trial of seven Bosnian Serb officers in November 2006 was true. Zdravko Tolimir, former Mladic’s assistant for intelligence and security in the VRS Main Staff, is charged with the same crimes in Srebrenica and Zepa; the seven Bosnian Serbs were all convicted of those crimes.
The witness described how on 11 July 1995, after Mladic’s troops overran Srebrenica, he and his father and brother joined a column of civilians and BH Army soldiers that took off towards Tuzla through the woods. The witness’s mother and sister sought shelter in Potocari near the UN Dutch Battalion base.
As the witness recounted, the Serb forces ambushed the column several times. The witness saw gruesome sights: dismembered bodies and persons whose throats had been cut. Twice the witness got separated from his father and brother but managed to find them before they surrendered to the VRS in the morning of 13 July 1995 in a field near Sandici. They heard people calling on them to surrender from the base of the hill. They also saw a white UN personnel carrier and soldiers with blue helmets; this led them to believe that UNPROFOR troops were there and that ‘it would not be so easy to kill us all’. In the end, it turned out that Mladic’s troops had seized the UN armored personnel carrier and that Serb soldiers wore blue helmets. ‘We realized that they used it to lure us to surrender’, the witness said.
The men who gathered in the field had to surrender all their money and valuables. The witness was allowed to bring water from a nearby house. The witness seized that opportunity to sneak onto a bus with women and children. The buses stopped in Sandici on their way from Potocari towards Kladanj. The witness never saw his father again; his remains had not been found.
In the cross-examination, General Tolimir claimed that the column moving towards Tuzla was a legitimate military target because it contained a large number of BH Army soldiers. The accused contended that the men had been ordered by the BH Army to head into the woods. Tolimir tried to corroborate his claim that most of the victims from the column lost their lives in the fighting as they were trying to break through to Tuzla. According to General Tolimir, a number of Bosniaks were killed ‘fighting each other’.
The witness dismissed all the claims of the accused, explaining that his father and brother had decided to go to the forest ‘on their own’ and that ‘like so many others, they followed the majority’. The witness confirmed that there were armed soldiers in the column but this did not make it a legitimate military target. The witness also dismissed the suggestion of the accused that the mass killings in Srebrenica were a consequence of ‘the collusion between US president Bill Clinton and Alija Izetbegovic designed to bring about NATO intervention by sacrificing 5,000 Bosniaks’. The witness replied that he knew who killed his father; ‘I never heard such stories and I’m not really interested in them’. The presiding judge interrupted this line of questioning, reminding the accused that the witness had been ‘just a boy’ at the time, too young to be able to tell the court anything about the purported agreement between Clinton and Izetbegovic.

Bosnia Eurobasket: Recap of Bosnians who don't play for BiH that are in the tournament

Mirza Begic

Stanko Barac


There is always a collection of Bosnians not playing for Bosnia sprinkled in every basketball tournament in Europe. It seems to be the number one export for Bosnia, which has little to show for the loss of great basketball talents. This year is no different with Bosnia playing in Eurobasket and coming up with a 2-3 record when teams with inferior talent going much further including the Slovenes, Finland the most suprising team of the tournament Macedonia. Having already covered the Bosnian national teams games in the tournament here is my recap of the Bosnian players who don't play for BiH.

Emir Preldzic SF Possibly the best player in Eurobasket 2011 (you could make the argument based upon the production in the minutes he plays) he has played a great tournament in very limited minutes (under 20 a game) Emir displays a great all around game and has he has grown into a stronger player has become even harder to defend. He was drafted by the NBA, I don't know if he will ever make it there as his game doesn't translate well into the NBA. It was a question if he was going to finally return home to Bosnia to play for the National team. He has openly said he would love to play for BiH in interviews in the past. An ongoing dispute between Bosnia and his adopted country of Slovenia was finally settled this summer leading to wild specualtion and rumors he would be returning to Bosnia. At last he ended up settling in with his second adopted country of Turkey and has proven to be an invaluable player, outplaying NBA player Hedo Turkoglu. Emir played very well in Eurobasket.

Mirza Begic C 7'3" center with skills and athleticism are very rare and Mirza has them both. He plays in Euroleague albiet in limited minutes. Mirza lacks great stamina which leads to silly fouls and short stints but he is a game changer when he is on the floor. He doesn't need to block shots to alter their trajectory and influence the shots put up by opponnents. He is a major reason why Slovenia was a suprise this year. Mirza has showed little interest in playing for BiH since they sold him off a youngster and showed little interest in his career until it took off. Mirza had a very solid tournament in limited minutes for the Slovenes.

Bojan Bogdanovic SG/SF Early identified as a major talent he took a major step forward this year and his rights were sent in the NBA draft to the Miami Heat. He could be a major contributor to the team and has a similar skill set to Mike Miller. Bojan played in Bosnia early in his career but was a quick commitment to the Croatian National Team. Bojan was the leader of a very dissapointing Croatian National Team.

Stanko Barac C A disapointing Croatian team seemed to under utilize his skills this summer. A top 10 talent in centers in Europe, he didn't seem to get the touches, coaching or minutes he deserved this summer. Stanko's younger brother Boris is a up and comer with Croatia as well. Stanko showed no interest in joining Bosnia and went to the motherland of Croatia instead. Stanko was inconsistent during the tournament, wasn't used to maximize his ability and Croatia didn't play well.

Edo Muric F Edo is a Slovene of Bosnian descent, he is a nice role player who has done a good job in limited minutes with the team. Every quality team needs players that can effect the outcome without scoring in bunches and Edo is one of these players. Edo didn't shoot well but played a quality game as a glue guy who defends and does some other nice things without dominating the ball.

Damir (Omerhodzic) Markota F Damir is as talented as almost anyone in Europe and yet fails to play to his potential in any major way. Damir even made it to the NBA with the Milwaukee Bucks only to play his way back to Croatia. A massivly skilled 6'11 player he seems destined to go the way of Andrej Festivov rather than ever live up to his immense talent. He reminds  me of a poor mans version of Gregor Fucka, minus the consistancy. He had an inconsistant tournament and was a major reason for the dissapointment in the tournament, people fall in love with his skill and get burned by his inconsistent production.

Nikola Vucevic C A NBA first round draft pick his father was a major contributor of the legendary KK BOSNA teams of the 1970's that won it all. He didn't play very well in a tournament a NBA first round draft pick should dominate.

Marko Keselj F As talented of a player in Europe, a great athelete who is finally growing into a sound basketball player. Marko has disavowed any connection to Bosnia, even though he was born there and carries a Bosnian passport. Even to the point that today he claims to have been born in Belgrade and not Bosnia. He is one of those players who if he stays healthy could have an explosive rise from the age of 28-31. He doesn't score very well and his play was inconsistent during the tournament.

Report Bosnia and Hercigovina have the second worst roads in the world!

 

By the quality of her roads, BH is 141th in the world among total 142 countries in the World Economic Forum’s report about global competitiveness.

This upsetting information shows that Moldavia is the only country behind BH, while countries such as Burundi, Burkina Faso, Nepal, Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Tanzania rank higher.

Croatia is best-ranked in the region at position 27, and Slovenia is second at 44.

Experts say that, although worrying, this information should be considered taking into account a country’s geographical positioning.

According to the president of the Republika Srpska association for furthering transport, BH has implemented the least of European standards in the construction of arterial roads.

Some European analyses indicate that more than half of main roads in the country are very risky.

EX-YUGOSLAVIA: Talks over 20 million dollar residence in New York will be held in Sarajevo

COMMUNIST PARTIES: A silver service gathers dust in the palatial pad acquired by Yugoslavia’s Marshal Tito (right) in 1975 for $100,000.
The last battlefield in the breakup of Yugoslavia is a $20 million apartment on Park Avenue.
Twelve years after the bloodshed ended in the Balkans, the fighting continues over an abandoned duplex the former communist nation once owned at one of Manhattan’s best addresses.
The palatial pad at 730 Park Ave. could soon hit the market, but the five warring factions first have to agree on a broker and to divide up the tarnished silver and dust-coated crystal.
“This is closing the final chapter,” said Milan Milanovic, the deputy ambassador to the United Nations from Serbia.

 

BALKAN CRISIS: This neglected, $20 million Park Avenue apartment, once the Big Apple foothold of the former Yugoslavia, has seen better days.

 

The duplex, once home to Yugoslavia’s UN envoys, was vacated in 1992 when Yugoslavia began to dissolve.
A new buyer of the 2,325-square-foot apartment can hobnob with former “60 Minutes” anchor Mike Wallace, who lives across the hall.
The 14-room duplex has six bedrooms, four bathrooms, two half- baths -- and 19 years of dirt and dust.
Paint is peeling from the ceiling of the salmon-colored living room. Silver serving pieces, desperately in need of a polish, sit on a buffet in the formal dining room. The kitchen contains a microwave oven the size of an air conditioner, and the pantry still holds a jar of maraschino cherries and Thai pepper paste.
Yugoslavia bought the apartment for $100,000 in 1975, when Marshal Josip Broz Tito ruled the country.
The furnishings are remnants of the apartment’s last occupant, Darko Silovic, the final UN ambassador to represent the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
When the country began to break up in 1992, Silovic, a Croatian, resigned his post in protest of his government’s Serbian leadership. He initially refused to leave his Park Avenue digs, which would go to his replacement, a Serb.
The duplex became a no-man’s land, collateral damage from the fighting among the successor states. Five republics -- Serbia, Slovenia, Bosnia, Croatia and Macedonia -- laid claim to it. A judge ruled in 1995 that the matter was a political one and not for the courts.
Eventually, Serbia stepped in to pay the charges, now up to $12,300 a month. But with the ownership in dispute, the co-op refused to allow Serbian or other diplomats to live there.
A 2001 agreement among the successor states laid a framework for how former Yugoslav properties around the globe should be divided, but the Manhattan apartment remained empty and in limbo.
An agreement to sell the Park Avenue pad is expected to be inked this week in Sarajevo. Once brokers are selected and a sale is finally made, Serbia will get 39.5 percent of the proceeds, according to a formula based on the economic power of each successor country.
Then Serbia can fight another battle -- to recoup the $2 million in maintenance it has paid for an empty apartment over 19 years.

Belgrade court rules that Vucurevic be placed in custody, may finally face justice for crimes committed as mayor of Trebinje Bosnia and Hercigovina

 

Bozidar Vucurevic

A Belgrade court on Monday ruled that the wartime mayor of the southern Bosnian town of Trebinje, Bozidar Vucurevic, who is wanted by Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina on war crimes charges and who this past weekend escaped from Serbia to Trebinje, should be placed in custody for ignoring his duty to report to the court twice a week.

A spokesperson for the Belgrade High Court was quoted by the local media as saying that the investigating judge in charge of the case had requested the department for war crimes of the Serbian Ministry of the Interior to check information that Vucurevic had left Serbia.

After Vucurevic escaped to Trebinje, the Belgrade High Court said on Sunday that it had approved both Croatia's and Bosnia and Herzegovina's request for his extradition.

Serbian Justice Minister Snezana Malovic would not comment on Vucurevic's case, saying that she would make a final decision on extradition after the court decides on the matter.

Malovic expressed confidence that a decision on Vucurevic's extradition would be possible to carry out.

Speaking of a recent transfer from France to Croatia of Milorad Momic, a former member of the Serbian paramilitary unit "Scorpions", Malovic said the Serbian judiciary had still not received official information on the matter, adding that Serbia would cooperate with Croatia in the case.

Momic, who is charged with war crimes, was transferred from France to Croatia on September 2, after he was arrested in France in early February on an Interpol warrant. After his transfer to Croatia, Momic, who is being tried in his absence at the Vukovar County Court, was placed in custody in Osijek.

He is believed to have participated in the killing of some 8,000 Muslims in Srebrenica in 1995.

My 3 year old Dejan declares "I want to go to a Bosnian school!"

My wife asked Dejan were he wants to go to school next year and his replay was " I want to go to Bosnian school"!

A sweet gesture, I am sure Dejan knew would draw a positive response from his parents. Unfortunately there are no Bosnian schools here in Milwaukee and I wouldn't want to send him to a Serbian school were they would teach him Draza Mihalovic is a hero and Tito a criminal.

I guess we will just have to settle for a another school here and give Dejan some cultural experiences until then. I would love for him to spend a summer at the American University in Sarajevo when he is a teenager.

9-11, Bosnia and my experiances with both on the 10th anniversary of this crime

 

Bosnia us 9/11 anniversary

Location: Sarajevo, Bosnia

September 9, 2011

US Marines lower the flag of The United States of America to half staff in front of the US embassy in Sarajevo, marking the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terror attacks on New York and Washington, in Sarajevo, Bosnia, on Friday, Sept. 9, 2011.

I was suppose to by flying to Bosnia on 09/14/01 when the terrorists attacks happened on 9-11. I wasn't sure when flights were going to resume again and I kept waiting watching when flights resumed, first domestic flights and then international ones after my flight date. People encouraged me not to go if the flight became  available but I said there is not place in the world I would rather be than in Bosnia. Alas my flight was cancelled and I recheduled it for the next September and I was there on the one year anniversary.

I wasn't sure what to expect to be in a Muslim country on the one year anniversary of 9-11 but it was a pleasant, heart warming surprise. Bosnians love America and those Americans who tend to know something about Bosnia or spent time there in the postwar era love Bosnia in return. The compassion shown by Bosnians was a pleasant surprise, I remember the American flag lapel pins at the Bosnian banks, the kind gestures of reconciliation and the kind questions of post 9-11 America.

I think that a lot of Bosnians took it particularly hard that there "Muslim" brethren had perpetrated such a large scale crime on there behalf and on behalf of Muslims around the world who were slighted by America. America was the only country in the west that supported a unified, unitary Bosnian state. We were the backers of Bosnia much like Germany supported Croatia and Russia supported the Serbs...We did have a dog in this fight and it was a massive underdog at that.

I think in many ways it just reinforced my feelings about Bosnia, Bosnians and Muslims in general. That they are kind, caring compassionate people that understand suffering and can identify with it in others.

I am going out of my way to avoid these 9-11 commemorations, staring at a twisted piece of metal that is now a sculpture or watching people jump out of buildings won't bring anyone back or honor their memory. Do something nice for someone you don't know is the best way to respond to the cruel events that day 10 years ago. Our response in these situations is more important than the actual event themselves...

September my favorite month to visit Bosnia and Herzigovina and Sarajevo

September is my favorite month to visit Bosnia, the weather is warm and fantastic, yet not too hot. You miss the rush of summer tourists (yes there is now an abundance of people visiting Bosnia and rediscovering the gifts she has to offer the world). The beautiful beginning of the changes of seasons are a great reason to get to see the natural beauty she has to offer.

Also the cost of airfare is down a bit from the peak summer prices. Some of the other costs associated with travel drops off in September/October and stay low until the end of May.

Bosnia in the fall with warm days and cool nights are made for a relaxing late summer vacation. It also fits the speed of everyday life in Bosnia. I love being in Bosnia and spending time in Sarajevo and September is just the right mix of leisure and love.

Bosnia: Abdic wants Bosnian authorities to give him back Agrokomerc

 

Fikret Abdic

The former director of the Velika Kladusa-headquartered Agrokomerc company, Fikret Abdic, who is serving his 15-year prison term in Croatia for war crimes in western Bosnia, has urged the authorities in Bosnia and Herzegovina to transfer to him management of that food-producing company as, his daughter said, he was able to revive production in that prewar agribusiness giant.

This unusual request has been sent to hundreds of addresses of various institutions in Bosnia which Abdic believes can decide on the fate of the remnants of that company.

In the late 1970s Agrokomerc, with Abdic at its helm, started to grow by cooperating with local farmers, building chicken farms and providing jobs for thousands of people in the region of Velika Kladusa and Cazin.

"I propose that I, as the creator and driving force of the Agrokomerc project, should be awarded Agrokomerc back so that we can restart production in that business giant," Abdic said in a written statement presented by his daughter Elvira Abdic-Jelenovic, a member of the Bosnian parliament, at a news conference in Sarajevo.

"Whether Fikret Abdic is free or in prison is irrelevant. What is relevant is the (Bosnian) state's position on the fate of Agrokomerc," Abdic-Jelenovic said while commenting on the fact that her father is still behind bars in the Croatian city of Pula.

She expressed hope that the Croatian authorities would grant the request of the Abdic family for an early release of Fikret Abdic, who has been behind bars since 2001.

Sarajevo: Penelope Cruz arrives in Bosnia for new film

Authorities say Spanish actress Penelope Cruz is in Bosnia to film Sergio Castellitto's "Venuto al Mondo."

The movie is about a single mother, Gemma, who brings her 16-year-old son to Sarajevo, where his father died in the 1990s Bosnian conflict. It is based on a best-seller by Margaret Mazzantini.

An announcement from the Sarajevo city government says Cruz arrived Wednesday and will film at various locations in town.

The filming will start Sept. 12 and last for 11 days.

 

Bosnia & Hercigovina 2011 Eurobasket Basketball recap

Eurobasket 2011 is over for Bosnia and Herzegovina, the team ended up going 2-3 barely missing out on advancing due to losing to an inferior Finland team who snuck in due to the head to head win against Bosnia by a resounding margin of 28 points! Bosnia was lucky enough to get put into the easiest group and will put a positive spin on the whole experience. It is true that Bosnia won two games, both times by getting there shots to fall and outstanding play by the big three of Dedovic, Domercant and Teletovic. The downside is this team was capable of so much more, if the team would have been lead by a more competent coach and used a better, more authentic selection process they easily could have won their group. Greece was a disappointing team with the withdrawal of some of there top talent. Croatia went very young and ended up lacking leadership and a go to player. Finland was well coached and had three genuine players which was enough to push them into the playoff round. Macedonia as usual, outplayed their talent level and played an outstanding team game. Macedonia is the opposite of Bosnia, everyone signs up to represent the team, they don't lose players to other countries and get every ounce of talent out of their team and are well coached and disciplined. Montenegro were surprisingly disappointing considering their meteoric rise since becoming independent from Serbia.

Bosnia can look to some positives from this tournament but coaching wouldn't be one of them. Sabit Hadzic proved to be a poor selector of talent as well as lacking in coaching and leadership as well as technical skill. The lack of  guidance in letting Mirza Teletovic camp from the outside against Greece was inexcusable. Mirza went 0-9 from 3pt land and didn't want to get physical and mix it up with the Greek big men. It would have made a major difference if they had a real center like Nedzad Sinanovic, Ratko Varda or even Ogjenjen Kuzmic to keep some of the big man muscle from packing the lane against Bosnia.

A recap of the Bosnian players in the tournament...

Mirza Teletovic PF In the two wins Mirza was fantastic averaging over 24pts a game and almost 50% from two and three. In the three loses he averaged under 10pts and shot a terrible percent, it's not hard to figure out what teams need to do to defeat Bosnia. He would have benefited greatly from playing next to a genuine center who could pose a threat both offensively and defensively for the team. Still, by far the best and most talented player on the team C+

Nihad Dedovic SG Played well in every game except the blowout loss to Finland. He played a mature game and stayed away from his weakness (outside shooting) and played to his strengths and generally played within himself. The only real criticism of his play was his lack of ball handling and ball movement. B

Henry Domercant SG/PG Not a genuine point guard, although he can handle the ball well and play it in small stretches. Had two big games against Finland and Croatia, otherwise struggled. He has been a warrior for Bosnia, since taking over for Terrel Castle as the naturalized player on the team. Bosnia should consider a genuine point guard or center for the naturalized position, a more important role on the team than a combo guard who is only average defensively and at passing. C-

Nemanja Gordic PG/SG Played well in the first two games before disappearing in the last three. He and Henry Domercant fulfill similar duties on a team and there skills tend to overlap leaving little need for two player who play the exact same positions and role within a team. Another reason why Bosnia would benefit from having a different naturalized player. Nemanja always seems to be banged up and nicked. He's a good athlete and defender and good, if inconsistent outside shooter. C-

Sasa Vasiljevic PG Sasa played surprisingly well considering that he was the only genuine point guard to see playing time for Bosnia in these games. Sasa isn't a great shooter but doesn't take a lot of bad shots either. He always keeps his turnovers to a minimum, keeping the team alive with possessions. His defense is suspect due to his lack of quickness but is crafty and smart. B-

Elemedin Kikanovic C/PF The most perplexing choice for Bosnia was starting Kikanovic. He played well offensively but his physical weakness put his team in a bad position time and time again. A big reason why Bosnia gave up so many points in these games. He is a talent physically and with his shooting but he is now 23, coming off a missed season due to doping and his weaknesses don't seem to be getting any better. C-

Goran Ikonic SG/SF Goran is a solid pro who seems to get better with age. He is a great role player who doesn't complain about his role on the team if he is starting or coming off the bench. Bosnia is lucky to have such a solid professional. His only weakness is quickness, guarding on the perimeter. B

Edin Bavcic PF/C Edin just never got a chance to really make a contribution during these games. He played under 10 minutes in every game except against Croatia. A tough position for a veteran who is used to starting to come off the bench cold and not get much of a shot. He really didn't contribute much, but is more of a result of coach Hadzic not forcing the action with match ups that favor Bosnia. D

Kenan Bajramovic F Kenan played well in the games and is a solid professional. He always gets everything from his ability. His defense and free throw shooting are below average but otherwise is a solid role player who contributes to the team. His lack of lateral quickness keeps him from being a good defender, but he tries hard. C

Aleksej Nesovic PG A solid professional who got little chance to play in these games only getting garbage minutes against Finland. Bosnia could have used his tough hard nosed defense against Macedonia in a critical game were Vasiljevic's defense was exploited by McCaleb and Illievski. N/A

Ermin Jazvin C Through no fault of his own Ermin ended up on the team in a tough position after the Varda debacle and coach Hadzic terrible bungling of the roster. It seems strange as to why he was added to the team over some others like Sinanovic, Kuzmic, Varda, Krupalija or even keeping Adnan Hodzic and his interior scoring. Ermin was a true professional through this whole experience and much like Nesovic, there were times when his defense, rebounding and positioning would have benefited the team greatly N/A

Milan Milosevic SF His inclusion into the team makes you question everything that the leadership of Bosnia say and do. We are talking about a journeyman who since leaving a low level team in Sloboda Dita Tuzla hasn't kept a job his entire career. Now 26 there is nothing that he exhibits that says he should have been kept over Kapelan, Hodzic or including a youngster like Vrabac, Gacic, Halilovic or a veteran proven scorer like the Kharimanovic's or Ivan Opacak or so many others. It really is insulting to the Bosnian basketball fan that you would include someone of such a low level of skill on such an important team. F

Bosnia and Herzegovina oust nine-man Belarus 1-0 in Zenica!

Bosnia and Herzegovina shut the door on nine-man Belarus's UEFA EURO 2012 hopes after substitute Zvjezdan Misimović's late goal inflicted a second defeat in five days on Bernd Stange's side.
Misimović's strike ensured that Bosnia and Herzegovina followed up their 2-0 victory in Minsk on Friday and left them well placed to claim at least a play-off spot in Group D. Safet Sušić's team had entered the double-header two points behind Belarus but now stand four clear, one point shy of leaders France whom they face in a decisive-looking final qualifier in Paris on 11 October, four days hosting Luxembourg.
For Belarus a campaign that began so brightly with a 1-0 win in France has fallen apart in the past week and they have now slipped to fourth in the standings below Romania as well. They lost Timofei Kalachev to a second yellow card after 34 minutes in Zenica and then lost another man with five minutes remaining when Aleksandr Martynovich collected the second of his two yellow cards. Two minutes later home captain Edin Džeko teed up Misimović to fire home from 18 metres and seal Belarus's fate.
Both players had earlier missed good opportunities, Džeko missing the target after 16 minutes before Misimović skimmed the woodwork in the second half after a fine piece of individual play. Eventually, Bosnia and Herzegovina made their supremacy tell and the consequence for Belarus is that they will visit Romania on 7 October with only pride to play for.

Bosnia:Landmark conviction of JNA Army chief Momcilo Perisic proves Serbia's guilt in Bosnian war crimes

UN court jails ex-Yugoslav army chief

Posted September 07, 2011 05:58:32

A UN war crimes court has sentenced ex-Yugoslav army chief Momcilo Perisic to 27 years in jail for helping the Bosnian Serb army murder and persecute Bosnian Muslims including at Srebrenica in 1995.

His sentencing sparked mixed reactions in the Balkans, with Serbia calling it excessive and Bosnia too lenient.
Perisic, 67, the Yugoslav army's highest-ranking officer, was found guilty of 12 of 13 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity, including at Srebrenica, scene of Europe's worst wartime atrocity since World War II, as well as the shelling and sniping of the Bosnian capital Sarajevo during its infamous siege from 1992-95.
He is the first official from the Belgrade-controlled Yugoslav republic to be convicted for crimes committed in Bosnia. Belgrade has always denied any involvement in the war in Bosnia.
Bakone Moloto, presiding judge at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, said Perisic knew the Bosnian Serb army's actions "encompassed grave crimes against the civilian population".
Prosecutors in March asked for life imprisonment against Perisic, a close collaborator of Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic who died in his Hague detention cell in 2006.
Perisic is the only senior Yugoslav official to be sentenced before the court for the Srebrenica massacre after Milosevic, also implicated in the mass killings, died mid-trial.
The 18 other defendants for their role at Srebrenica are mainly Bosnian Serbs, including former army chief Ratko Mladic, the court's most wanted man until his arrest in May.
Reaction in the Balkans to the sentencing was mixed, with Serbia saying it was excessive, and Bosnia saying it was too mild.
"I regret this extremely high sentence," Serbian defence minister Dragan Sutanovac was quoted by Blic daily's Internet site as saying.
In Bosnia, the sentence was slammed, with Srebrenica massacre survivors also saying it would not contribute to reconciliation in the volatile Balkan region.
The judgement "is killing the victims again", the head of the Srebrenica Mothers association, Munira Subasic, told the Bosnian ONASA news agency.

Natasa Kandic, a prominent Serbian human rights activist, said "the verdict is appropriate and corresponds" to the crimes he was found guilty of, Belgrade-based Beta news agency reported.