Timeline Bosnia
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Located
in
south-eastern Europe, Bosnia-Herzegovina is
divided into a Bosnian Serb republic and a Muslim-Croat federation.
Both parts have wide autonomy but share a common presidency,
parliament
and government. Muslims make up 48 percent of the population, Serbs
37
percent and Croats 13 percent.
1291
The Catholic Franciscan order arrived in Bosnia.
(SFC, 4/15/97, p.A10)
1389 Jun 28, The Serbs were
defeated in the Battle of Kosovo at the Field of the Blackbirds.
Sultan Murat, the Ottoman leader was killed in the battle. Serbs say
that Albanians aided the Turkish invaders. Historical evidence shows
that both forces were multinational and that Serbs and Albanian
fought on both sides. [see Jun 15] In 1999 Ismail Kadare, Albanian
author, wrote "Elegy for Kosovo," in which he retells the story of
the battle. Bosnian King Tvrtko and other Balkan princes along with
Albanians fought under the command of Serbian Prince Lazar.
(WSJ, 5/7/99, p.A1,18)(SFEC, 7/23/00, BR p.7)
1463 The Ottomans conquered
Bosnia.
(www.bartleby.com/67/314.html)
1479 The Turks erected a mosque
in the center of Banja Luka. It was leveled by the Serbs in 1993.
(WSJ, 8/26/98, p.A1)
1566 The Stari Most (Old
Bridge) was built over the Neretva River in Bosnia. It gave the city
of Mostar (bridge keeper) its name. It was destroyed in 1993 by
Bosnian Croat artillery. An annual diving contest was held off the
bridge since it was built. In 2004 the bridge was reopened.
(SFC, 5/15/00, p.A12)(WSJ, 6/1/04, p.A1)(Econ,
11/26/05, p.64)
1566 A Serbian Orthodox
monastery was built in Zitomislic, Bosnia. It was destroyed in 1992
during the Bosnian War, but was rebuilt and reopened in May 2005.
(Econ, 11/26/05, p.64)
1699 Prince Eugene of Savoy
looted and burned Sarajevo, Bosnia.
(SSFC, 12/4/05, p.F5)
1762 The Osman-Pasha mosque was
built in Trebinje. It was destroyed during the 1992-1995 war.
(SSFC, 5/6/01, p.A15)
1809 Jul 5-1809 Jul 6, Napoleon
beat Austria’s archduke Charles at the Battle of Wagram. He annexed
the Illyrian Provinces (now part of Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and
Herzegovina, Serbia, and Montenegro), and abolished the Papal
States.
(http://tinyurl.com/vx8dk)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Wagram)
1878 Mar 3, Russia and the
Ottomans signed the Treaty of San Stefano, granting independence to
Serbia. With the Treaty of San Stefano (and subsequent negotiations
in Berlin) in the wake of the last Russo-Turkish War, the Ottoman
Empire lost its possession of numerous territories including
Bulgaria, Montenegro, Romania, and Serbia. The Russo-Turkish wars
dated to the 17th century, the Russians generally gaining territory
and influence over the declining Ottoman Empire. In the last war,
Russia and Serbia supported rebellions in the Balkans. In concluding
the Treaty of San Stefano, the Ottomans released control of
Montenegro, Romania and Serbia, granted autonomy to Bosnia and
Herzegovina, and allowed an autonomous state of Bulgaria to be
placed under Russian control.
(HN, 3/3/99)(HNQ, 2/23/01)
1878 Mar 3, The Treaty of San
Stefano was signed after Russo-Turkish War. It assigned
Albanian-populated lands to Bulgaria, Montenegro and Serbia; but
Austria-Hungary and Britain blocked the treaty's implementation.
Albanian leaders meet in Prizren, Kosova, to form the League of
Prizren. The League initially advocated autonomy for Albania. At the
Congress of Berlin, the Great Powers overturned the Treaty of San
Stefano and divided Albanian lands among several states. The League
of Prizren began to organize resistance to the Treaty of Berlin's
provisions that affected Albanians.
(www, Albania,
1998)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_San_Stefano)
1878 Jul 13, The Treaty of
Berlin amended the terms of the Treaty of San Stefano, which had
ended the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78. The Congress of Berlin
divided the Balkans among European powers. Austria-Hungary and
Britain, alarmed at the possibilities of growing Russian power,
concluded the Treaty of Berlin, reducing the military and political
gains Russia had made with the San Stefano treaty.
(AP, 7/13/97)(HN, 7/13/98)(HNQ, 2/23/01)
1878-1918 Bosnia came under the rule of the
Austrian-Hungarian Empire. A representative from Vienna governed the
area.
(Econ, 11/26/05, p.65)
1880 The Serajevo Brewery was
built. Builders dug 3 wells down 600 feet to provide water for the
brewery. The Austro-Hungarian empire ruled Bosnia at this time.
(SFC,10/27/97, p.A8)
1881 The area around Bosnia was
annexed by the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Pope Leo XIII reasserted
the Catholic Church with dioceses in Sarajevo, Banja Luka and
Mostar.
(SFC, 4/15/97, p.A10)
1882 The Hotel Evropa was built
in Sarajevo, Bosnia. It was gutted by Serb shells in 1992.
Restoration after the 1992-1995 war was completed in 2008.
(Econ, 7/19/08, p.60)
1875 Jul 29, Peasants in Bosnia
and Herzegovina in the Balkans rebelled against the Ottoman army.
(HN, 7/29/98)
1878 Bosnia came under
Austro-Hungarian. This continued until 1918. A representative from
Vienna governed the area.
(Econ, 11/26/05, p.65)(Econ, 10/20/07, p.72)
1894 Jun 30, Gavrilo Princip,
Bosnian assassin (arch-duke Franz Ferdinand), was born.
(MC, 6/30/02)
1908 Oct 6, Austria annexed
Bosnia and Herzegovina.
(MC, 10/6/01)
1908 Dec 1, The Italian
Parliament debated the future of the Triple Alliance and asked for
compensation for Austria’s action in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
(HN, 12/1/98)
1911 The Black Hand was the
nickname for a secret society, Unity or Death, formed in 1911 by
Serbian army officers seeking liberation of Bosnia from Austrian
domination. These nationalist leaders sought the creation of a
Greater Serbia.
(HNQ, 5/29/99)
1912 A small Balkan War broke
out and was quelled by the major powers. Albanian nationalism
spurred repeated revolts against Turkish dominion and resulted in
the First Balkan War in which the Turks were driven out of much of
the Balkan Peninsula.
(V.D.-H.K.p.290)(Compuserve Online, Grolier’s
Amer. Acad. Enc./ Albania)
1913 May 30, Conclusion of the
First Balkan War.
(HN, 5/30/98)
1914 Jun 28, Austrian Archduke
Francis Ferdinand, heir to Austria-Hungary, and his wife, Sofia,
were assassinated in Sarajevo, Bosnia, by a Serb nationalist. As the
royal couple rode through the streets of Sarajevo in an open touring
car, seven young radicals from an obscure Serbian-Bosnian
nationalist group, called the Black Hand, lay in wait. An initial
assassination attempt failed, but a wrong turn brought the car near
Gavrilo Princip, who fired two shots at point-blank range into the
couple's bodies. Within minutes, both the Archduke and Sophia were
dead. Princip was arrested, but political tensions were so high
between Austria-Hungary and Serbia that war broke out as a result.
Like falling dominoes, international alliances brought one country
after another into the conflict. The event triggered World War I. In
2011 Adam Hochschild authored “To End All Wars: A Story of Loyalty
and Rebellion.”
(V.D.-H.K.p.252, 284-285,290)(AP, 6/28/97)(HNPD,
6/28/98)(Econ, 6/4/11, p.93)
1918 Apr 28, Gavrilo Princip
(22), Bosnian murderer of arch duke Ferdinand, died in prison of
tuberculosis.
(http://concise.britannica.com)(AP, 4/28/07)
1925 Aug 8, Alija Izetbegovic
(d.2003) was born in Bosanski Samac. He later led Bosnia's Muslims
during the 1992-95 war for independence and became one of the
republic's first postwar presidents.
(AP, 10/19/03)(SFC, 10/20/03, p.A18)
1928 Ivan Merz (32), Bosnian
Croat intellectual and theologian, died of meningitis. He was
beatified in 2003 by Pope John Paul II.
(AP, 6/22/03)
1929 Oct 3, The Kingdom of
Serbs, Croats and Slovenes formally changed its name to the Kingdom
of Yugoslavia. It included the regions of Serbia, Montenegro,
Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Herzegovina, and Macedonia. King
Alexander I renamed the Balkan state called the Kingdom of Serbs,
Croats, and Slovenes, Yugoslavia. The Kingdom had been formed on
December 1, 1918 and was ruled by the Serbian Karageorgevic dynasty.
It included the previously independent kingdoms of Serbia and
Macedonia, the Hungarian-controlled regions of Croatia and Slovenia,
the Austrian province of Dalmatia, Carniola and parts of Styria,
Carinthia and Istria.
(AP, 10/3/97)(HN, 10/3/98)(HNQ, 3/26/99)(LCTH,
10/3/99)
c1939 During WW
II Herzegovina became a stronghold of the Croatian
Ustashe movement allied to the Nazis. Local clergy was seen
condoning and supporting Ustashe mass slayings of ethnic Serbs.
(SFC, 4/15/97, p.A10)
1941 Dec 15-1941 Dec 23,
Catholic Sisters Jula Ivanisevic, Berchmana Leidenix, Krizina
Bojanc, Antonija Fabjan and Bernadeta Banja, who helped the poor
regardless of religion in the majority Serb village of Pale, Bosnia,
were killed in Gorazde and thrown into the River Drina. The sisters
were beatified in 2011.
(AP,
9/24/11)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drina_Martyrs)
1942 Mar 1, Tito established
the 2nd Proletariat Brigade in Bosnia.
(SC, 3/1/02)
1942 Mar 5, Josip Broz "Tito"
established the 3rd Proletariat Brigade in Bosnia.
(MC, 3/5/02)
1943 Nov 29, In Yugoslavia
partisan Tito formed a temporary government in Jajce, Bosnia.
(MC, 11/29/01)
1943 Jovan Ducic, a Serb poet
born in Trebinje, died in the US. He was reburied in his home town
in 2000.
(SFC, 10/23/00, p.A11)
1944 May 7, There was a German
assault on Tito's hideout in Drvar, Bosnia.
(MC, 5/7/02)
1980 May 4,
Marshal Josip Broz Tito (b.1892), Communist dictator of Yugoslavia
(1943-1980), died three days before his 88th birthday. He was a
Croat and tried to spread the Serbs out over the six Yugoslav
republics so that they would not dominate the country. His policy
was considered a major cause of the Bosnian war in the '90s.
(AP,
5/4/97)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josip_Broz_Tito)(WSJ, 8/8/95,
p. A-10)(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)
1984 Feb 8, Winter Olympics
opened in Sarajevo.
(HN, 2/7/97)
1990 Jul 31, The Assembly of
Bosnia-Herzegovina adopted constitutional amendments by which
Bosnia-Herzegovina was declared a democratic state of equal citizens
of the peoples of BH, Moslems, Serbs, Croats and others.
(www.balkan-archive.org.yu/politics/chronology/chron90.html)
1990 The Serb Democratic Party
was founded by Radovan Karadzic.
(SFC, 12/25/98, p.B8)
1991 Apr 6, Bosnian Serbs began
a war in a quest for their own ethnically pure republic.
(SFEC, 7/27/97, p.A6)
1991 Jun 25, The civil war in
Yugoslavia began when Croatia and Slovenia proclaimed independence
from Yugoslavia.
(HFA, '96, p.32)(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1991 Nov, Mile Mrksic, Miroslav
Radic, and Veselin Sljivan-Canin, officers in the Yugoslav National
Army, ordered the massacre of 261 Croats taken out of a Vukovar
hospital. Radic surrendered to Serbian authorities in 2003.
(SFC, 11/30/96, p.A15)(SFC, 4/22/03, A7)
1991 Dec 21, In
Bosnia-Herzegovina a Serb minority held an unofficial referendum
opposing separation from Yugoslavia. Local Serb leaders proclaimed a
new republic separate from Bosnia.
(SFC,10/16/97,
p.A12)(www.vdiest.nl/Europa/boznia.htm)
1992-1994 Croat Gen. Tihomir Blaskic ordered a
series of attacks on Muslim villagers in Bosnia as his forces tried
to secure the area for Croatia. In 2000 a UN Tribunal sentenced
Blaskic to 45 years in prison for war crimes. In 2004 the sentence
was reduced to 9 years.
(SFC, 3/4/00, p.A10)(WSJ, 7/30/04, p.A1)
1992 Jan 3, The UN, led by US
Sec. of State Cyrus Vance, brokered a cease-fire between the
Croatian government and rebel Serbs. Following subsequent breaches
the UN Protection Force (UNPROFOR) put 14,000 peacekeeping troops
into Croatia. The EC recognized the independence of Croatia.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)(SFC, 6/11/96, p.A14)
1992 Feb 29, Bosnia-Herzegovina
voted overwhelmingly for independence. The Muslim-led Bosnian
government declared independence.
(SFC, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SFC, 6/19/96, p.A10)
1992 Mar 1, Bosnian Serbs began
sniping in Sarajevo, after Croats and Moslems voted for Bosnian
independence.
(HN, 3/1/99)
1992 Mar 3, Bosnia’s Muslims
and Croats voted for independence in a referendum boycotted by
Serbs.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1992 Mar, Dusan Tadic was
granted power by Serb authorities who occupied his predominantly
Muslim community in the spring of this year. He use it to launch a
frenzy of violence in three detention camps, Omarska, Keraterm and
Trnopolje near his home village of Kozarac. Milojica Kos, a
commander at the Omarska camp, was detained by NATO troops in 1998.
In 2002 Dusan Knezevic, a Bosnian Serb accused of atrocities in the
camps, gave himself up to the Hague tribunal.
(SFC, 5/8/96, p.A-11)(SFC, 5/29/98, p.D4)
1992 Mar, The Tarcin camp for
holding Serbs began operating in Bosnia about this time. It was not
shut down until Jan, 1996.
(SFC, 12/2/98, p.A10)
1992 Apr 5, A medical student
(Suada Dilberovic) became the first fatality of war in
Bosnia-Herzegovina as Serb nationalists began forcibly opposing the
republic's secession from Yugoslavia.
(AP, 4/5/97)
1992 Apr 6, Alija Izetbegovic
declared independence for Bosnia. The European Community recognized
the former Yugoslav republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina as an independent
state.
(AP, 4/6/02)(SFC, 10/20/03, p.A18)
1992 Apr 6, War broke out in
northern Bosnia between the Bosnian government and local Serbs who
began to lay siege to the capital Serajevo. Bosnian Serb leader
Radovan Karadzic, a psychiatrist, began the war in Bosnia with the
help of Serbian Pres. Slobodan Milosevic, who ruled Yugoslavia and
the old Yugoslav People’s Army.
(SFC, 5/8/96, p.A-11) (WP. 6/29/96,
p.A20)(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1992 Apr, The EC recognized
Bosnia-Herzegovina and the US followed and also recognized Slovenia
and Croatia.
(SFC, 6/11/96, p.A14)
1992 Apr, Dragan Gagovic became
the police chief of Foca. He oversaw the detention of Muslims held
in a local sports hall. His men regularly beat and gang-raped female
detainees and he personally participated. He was later indicted for
war crimes and was killed during an arrest attempt in 1999.
(SFEC, 1/10/99, p.A17)
1992 Apr, In Bosnia Janko
"Tuta" Janjic, car mechanic, became a sub-commander and was
responsible for the rape and enslavement of dozens of Muslim
women. In 2000 Janjic killed himself with a grenade when NATO
troops came to arrest him.
(SFC, 10/14/00,
p.A10)(www.un.org/icty/indictment/english/foc-ii960626e.htm)
1992 Serb forces overran
Bosanski Samac. Mayor Blagoje Simic was later accused of instigating
and planning atrocities against non-Serb men. In 2001 he gave
himself up to the war crimes tribunal in the Hague.
(SFC, 3/13/01, p.A15)
1992 Apr-1992 Jul, Mladen
Vuksanovic (d.1999 at 57), writer and journalist, wrote a diary
during the first 100 days of rule by Radowan Karadzic in Pale,
Bosnia. The diary was published in Croatia in 1997 as "Pale, a
Diary, April-July 1992."
(SFC, 10/26/99, p.B4)
1992 May 2, Ejup Ganic took
over as Bosnia's acting president. Serbian prosecutors later alleged
that Ganic personally commanded a series of attacks on illegal
targets across Sarajevo, including an officers' club, a military
hospital and what the Serbs describe as a medical convoy making its
way out of town.
(AP, 3/4/11)
1992 May 3, Yugoslav Army
seized Bosnian Pres. Alija Izetbegovic on his return from peace
talks in Lisbon. He was released the next day.
(www.nytimes.com/specials/bosnia/context/apchrono.html)
1992 May 3, Armed men cruised
into Doboj and began a process of ethnic cleansing that pushed
62,000 non-Serbs from their homes in the surrounding area.
(WSJ, 11/3/97, p.A22)
1992 May 5, Yugoslav troops
evacuated Sarajevo under a deal struck with the UN. The troops
clashed with Bosnians under the leadership of Ejup Ganic. Some 42
soldiers were killed.
(Econ, 3/6/10,
p.70)(www.ess.uwe.ac.uk/comexpert/ANX/VI-01.htm#II.B.1)
1992 May 11, Leaders of 12
European countries recalled their ambassadors from Serb-dominated
Yugoslavia to protest Serb involvement in Bosnia's ethnic war.
(AP, 5/11/97)
1992 May 19, Members of a
Bosnian Serb paramilitary group allegedly killed 11 detained Bosniak
(Bosnian Muslim) civilians in the Hunters Lodge in Mostina, shooting
from automatic rifles and throwing hand grenades through an opened
door. In 2010 Milan Kornjaca (56) Milorad Zivkovic 54) and Dusko
Tadic (46) were charged with taking part in the killing.
(Reuters, 6/9/10)
1992 May 24-1992 Aug 30,
Serbian forces confined over 3,000 Bosnian Muslims and Croats in
inhuman conditions at the Keraterm prison camp. Detainees were
killed, sexually assaulted and beaten. In 1999 Dragan Kulundzija, a
shift commander at Keraterm, was arrested on charges of killing and
torturing prisoners.
(SFC, 6/8/99, p.A12)
1992 May 24-1992 Aug 30, Damir
Dosen served as a shift commander at the Keraterm prison camp in
northwestern Bosnia. Hundreds of Croats and Muslims were tortured
and died at a camp near Prijedor. In 1999 Dosen, a Bosnian Serb, was
arrested for war crimes and flown to the Hague for trial.
(WSJ, 10/26/99, p.A1)(SFC, 11/9/99, p.A14)
1992 May 25-1992 Aug 30,
Dragoljub Prcac, a Bosnian Serb, served as the deputy commander of
the Omarska prison camp. He was arrested by NATO peacekeepers for
war crimes in 2000. In 2001 Prcac and 3 others received sentences of
5-20 years. Zoran Zigic was sentenced to 25 years for his acts of
violence.
(SFC, 3/6/00, p.A12)(SFC, 11/3/01, p.C2)
1992 May 27, The 12-nation
European Community imposed trade sanctions on Serbia to stop its
interference in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
(AP, 5/27/97)
1992 May, Bosnia, Croatia and
Slovenia joined the UN.
(SFC, 6/11/96, p.A14)
1992 May, Ilija Jurisic, a
Bosnian security officer, ordered an attack on a Yugoslav army
convoy that killed at least 50 soldiers. In 2009 Jurisic was found
guilty of ordering the attack against the Serb-led army convoy
consisting of dozens of army trucks carrying some 100 soldiers
withdrawing from the predominantly Muslim Bosnian town of Tuzla. The
Serbian court sentenced him to 12 years in prison. On Oct 11, 2010,
an appeals court overturned the conviction and 12-year prison
sentence.
(AP, 9/28/09)(AP, 10/11/10)
1992 May, The UN security
council approved new commercial sanctions against Yugoslavia, i.e.
Serbia, for backing rebel Serbs in Croatia and Bosnia.
(SFC, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1992 May, Local Muslim forces
attacked the Serb village of Bjelovcina in the Konjic district. Serb
prisoners suffered at the Celebici camp. In 1997 Mirko Babic
testifies that he was forced to drink urine, lick his captor’s boots
and had his leg set on fire with gasoline.
(SFC, 3/13/97, p.A13)
1992 May, The Luka prisoner
camp in Brcko was commanded by Goran Jelisic. He was later indicted
by the UN for killing 16 Muslims and countless detainees. He was
picked up by UN troops in 1998. In 1998 Jelisic, who called himself
"the Serb Adolf," pleaded guilty to the murder of 12 Muslims and
Croats. Jelisic was acquitted of genocide but convicted of 31
accounts of torture and murder. In 1999 he was sentenced to 40 years
in prison.
(SFC, 1/22/98, p.E2)(SFC, 10/30/98, p.A16)(SFC,
10/20/99, p.B2)(SFC, 12/15/99, p.A16)
1992 May-1992 Oct, In Bosnia
Dragan Nikolic commanded the Susica detention camp near Vlasenica.
He was arrested in 2000 for war crimes at the camp where an
estimated 8,000 Muslims were held.
(SFEC, 4/23/00, p.C17)
1992 May-1992 Nov, Nikola
Vuckovic, a Bosnian-Serb soldier, allegedly beat and tortured
Bosnian Muslims and Croats during this period. Vuckovic later moved
to the US and was sued by a victim in 1998. Vuckovic returned to
Bosnia in 2001 and was put on trial in Atlanta in absentia.
(SFC, 10/22/01, p.B1)
1992 May-1992 Dec, At least 14
of 250 detainees were killed, tortured, raped or beaten over this
period at the Celibici Camp in central Bosnia. On Nov 16, 1998, a
UN tribunal convicted a Bosnian Croat and 2 Muslims for the
crimes at Celebici. Hazimn Delic, deputy commander, received a 20
year sentence; Zdravko Mucic, camp warden received 7 years; and Esad
Landzo received 15 years.
(SFC, 11/17/98, p.A14)(SFC, 2/21/01, p.A12)
1992 Jun 1, In Kljuc, Bosnia,
local Serbs rounded up Muslims and shot them. About 200 bodies were
buried at the cave at Laniste and uncovered in 1996.
(SFC, 10/15/96, p.A10)
1992 Jun 14, In Sokolina,
Bosnia, a massacre occurred that later yielded 47 bodies from a mass
grave. Survivors later said that Serbs blew up a busload of Muslim
men who had been told that they were on their way to a prisoner
exchange.
(WSJ, 6/25/96, p.A1)(SFC, 6/25/96, p.A8)
1992 Jun 22, In Trnovace,
Bosnia, 14 Muslims were massacred. In 1997 Novislav Djajic, member
of a Bosnian Serb military unit, was convicted and sentenced to 5
years for participating.
(SFC, 5/24/97, p.C1)
1992 Jun, Some 140 Muslims were
imprisoned and burned alive and others summarily shoot in some of
the cruelest ethnic cleansing of the Bosnian war. In 2008 Bosnian
Serb cousins Milan and Sredoje Lukic faced charges of murder,
extermination and cruel treatment at the UN war crimes tribunal in
The Hague for violence in and around the historic south-eastern
Bosnian town of Visegrad.
(AP, 7/9/08)
1992 Jun 30, Planes loaded with
food and medicine arrived at the airport in Sarajevo,
Bosnia-Herzegovina, as part of an international relief effort.
(AP Internet 6/30/97)
1992 Jun, In Vrbanjci acting
police chief Djurdard Kusljic ordered the deaths of 6 Bosnian
Muslims. Kusljic was convicted of genocide and murder in 1999 and
was sentenced to life in prison.
(SFC, 12/16/99, p.C2)
1992 Jul 11, It was later
alleged on Dutch TV that Dutch troops deliberately drove an armored
vehicle into a Muslim blockade on this day and killed as many as 30
people.
(SFC, 8/21/98, p.A14)
1992 Jul 24, In Bosnia Serb
prison guards at the former ceramics factory of Keraterm fired
machine guns through metal doors of "Room 3" where over 200
prisoners were trapped. The carnage continued for hours. In 2001
Dusko Sikirica (camp commander), Dragan Kolundzija and Damir Dosen
were tried at the Hague for their roles in the slaughter. Sikirica
was sentenced to 15 years in prison. Dosen and Kolundzija received 5
and 3 year sentences.
(SFC, 3/20/01, p.A11)(SFC, 11/14/01, p.A19)
1992 Jul 26, Muhamed Cehajic,
mayor of Prijedor, Bosnia, disappeared and was believed killed.
Milomar Stakic became mayor and was later accused of direct
involvement in establishing concentration camps at Omarska, Keraterm
and Trnopolje. Momcilo Radanovic was later accused of leading a
brigade that carried out numerous massacres and extortion of money
from non-Serbs. Stakic was arrested in 2001 and sentenced to life in
prison in 2003. In 2005 Isabelle Wesselingh and Arnaud Vaulerin
authored “Raw Memory: Prijedor, Laboratory of Ethnic Cleansing.”
(SFC, 2/1/97, p.A12)(SFC, 3/24/01, p.A12)(SFC,
8/1/03, p.A3)(Econ, 7/25/05, p.72)
1992 Jul, Yugoslavia was
suspended from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in
Europe (OSCE) for fomenting war in Bosnia.
(SFC, 3/28/98,
p.A8)(www.hrw.org/wr2k1/europe/yugoslavia3.html)
1992 Aug 21, Serbian soldiers
separated over 200 men, mostly Croats and Muslims, from a convoy of
civilians from the Trnopolje detention camp in Bosnia. The captives
were taken to a wooded ravine at Mount Vlasic and shot dead.
In 2003 Darko Mrdja, commander of a special police unit, admitted to
a court in the Hague of playing a role in the slaughter. In 2009
Bosnian forensic experts found the remains of at least 60 Muslims
and Croats in the ravine.
(SSFC, 7/27/03, p.A8)(AP, 8/26/09)
1992 Aug, Viewers worldwide
were shocked by TV pictures of emaciated Muslim captives in Serb-run
prison camps in Bosnia.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1992 Aug, The Serb-run Omarska
camp closed. Bosnian Serb Dusan Tadic, former cafe owner and karate
instructor, was later accused of beating, mutilating, and killing
Bosnian Muslims at the concentration camps run by the Serbians at
Omarska and Keraterm. On May 7, 1997, he became the first war
criminal convicted of war crimes in the Bosnian War between the
Bosnian Muslims and the former Yugoslavia.
(WSJ, 5/9/96,
p.A-18)(www.bookrags.com/biography-dusan-tadic-cri/)
1992 Sep 3, An Italian relief
plane was shot down by ground-to-air missiles outside of Sarajevo,
Bosnia-Herzegovina.
(AP, 9/3/97)
1992 Oct 9, The U.N. Security
Council voted to ban all military flights over Bosnia-Herzegovina.
(AP, 10/9/97)
1992 Oct, Four members of the
Avengers, a Serbian paramilitary force, abducted 16 Muslims from a
bus in Serbia and took them to Bosnia where they were tortured and
executed. In 2005 a Serbian court 4 convicted former Avengers for
the murders. 2 men in custody, Djordje Sevic and Dragutin Dragicevic
were sentenced to 15 and 20 years respectively. Two others, Milan
Lukic and Oliver Krsmanovic, were tried in absentia and received
20-year jail terms.
(AP, 7/16/05)
1992 Nov 28, In
Bosnia-Herzegovina, a breakthrough in the relief effort came with
the delivery of 137 tons of food and supplies to the isolated town
of Srebrenica (place of silver).
(AP, 11/28/97)
1992 Dec 31, U.N.
Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali was jeered by Bosnians
during a visit to Sarajevo.
(AP, 12/31/97)
1992 Sefir Halilovic helped
form the Bosnian army and was its 1st commander for over a year. In
2001 he surrendered to the UN war crimes tribunal to face charges of
atrocities committed by his forces against ethnic Croats.
(SFC, 9/25/01, p.A12)
1992 Zeljko Raznatovic, aka
Arkan, was a Serb paramilitary leader involved in the seizure of the
north-eastern Bosnian town of Bijeljina, that became a symbol of
Serb atrocities.
(SFC, 5/21/96, p.A-12)
1992 In Brcko Serb soldiers and
militiamen conquered the town and expelled the Muslim and Croat
population. As many as 7,000 unarmed captives were killed.
(SFC, 2/15/97, p.A10,11)
1992 In Mostar 3,200 Serbs
disappeared and 27,000 were forced to move.
(WSJ, 8/1/96 p.A15)
1992 Croatian Pres. Franjo
Tudjman picked Mate Boban (d.7/7/97) to form an independent enclave
of Bosnian Croats. It was called the Croatian Community of
Herzeg-Bosna. Muslims and Serbs were purged and some of the worst
concentration camps of the war were set up for Muslim civilians.
(SFC, 7/9/97, p.A15)
1992 Sep, About this time more
than 30 Muslims in the Serb-run Omarska camp were murdered. Dusan
Tadic, former cafe owner and karate instructor, was convicted in
1997 of participating in the brutal murders.
(WSJ, 5/9/96, p.A-18)
1992 In Foca Zoran Vukovic,
leader of a paramilitary group, tortured and raped Muslim women and
forced them to serve as sex slaves to paramilitaries. Vukovic was
arrested in 1999 for war crimes and shipped to the Hague.
(SFC, 12/25/99, p.A16)
1992-1993 Bosnian Croats attacked the Lasva Valley
area of central Bosnia. In 1996 nine men were charged with war
crimes by the UN tribunal on war crimes. 3 Bosnian Croats were later
released for insufficient evidence.
(SFC, 6/28/96, p.A13)(SFC,12/20/97, p.A10)
1992-1994 Major Gen'l. Stanislav Galic led the
Bosnian Serb Sarayevo Romanija Corps. In 1999 Ganic was captured by
NATO SFOR troops for war crimes. In 2003 Gen. Galic was sentenced to
20 years in prison.
(SFC, 12/21/99, p.A16)(SFC, 12/6/03, p.A11)
1992-1995 In 2000 Joe Sacco published "Safe Area
Gorazde: The War in Eastern Bosnia 1992-1995," a comic book
reportage on the breakup of Yugoslavia.
(SFEC, 7/2/00, BR p.4)
1992-1995 Gen'l. Momir Talic of Bosnia commanded
the 1st Krajina Corps. Talic and Radoslav Brdjanin planned and
ordered a terror offensive early in the war that killed hundreds of
Muslims and Croats and forced thousands to flee Prijedor a d Sanski.
Talic was arrested in Austria in 1999 on a secret UN war crimes
indictment. Both men pleaded not guilty to 12 counts of genocide at
the Hague. During the 3 ½ years of war some 200,000 Bosnians
were dead or missing and an estimated 20,000 women were raped. In
2004 Brdjanin was convicted on 8 of 12 charges and sentenced to 32
years in prison. In 2005 a war crimes researcher reduced the death
toll in Bosnian war to about 100,000.
(SFC, 8/26/99, p.A12)(SFC, 1/12/00, p.A11)(SFC,
3/30/00, p.A18)(SFC, 9/2/04, p.A11)(AP, 11/23/05)
1992-1995 The war between Bosnia's Croats, Muslims
and Serbs claimed some 100,000 lives. Government officials estimated
that at least 20,000 mostly Muslim women were raped during the
conflict.
(AFP, 11/29/10)
1993 Jan 2, Leaders of the
three warring ethnic groups in Bosnia-Herzegovina met face-to-face
in Geneva.
(AP, 1/2/98)
1993 Jan 7, A preliminary
report prepared for the European Community said Serb fighters may
have raped about 20,000 women in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
(AP, 1/7/98)
1993 Jan 8, Bosnian deputy
Prime Minister Hakija Turajlic was shot 7-8 times and killed by Serb
gunmen in the presence of French peacekeepers while riding in a UN
personnel carrier at a Serb checkpoint near the Serajevo airport. In
1998 government agents arrested Goran Vasic, the suspected gunman of
the murder.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)(AP, 1/8/98)(SFC, 2/7/98,
p.A12)
1993 Jan, Heavy fighting and
the bitter Serb siege of Serajevo continued. The UN and European
Union peace efforts failed and war broke out between Muslims and
Croats in Bosnia.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1993 Jan, In Bosnia on the
Orthodox Christmas Day Muslim forces in Kravica killed at least 30
people.
(Econ, 7/25/05, p.18)
1993 Feb 13, The government of
Bosnia-Herzegovina began blocking the distribution of food in the
capital of Sarajevo to protest ineffective international attempts to
stop the war.
(AP, 2/13/98)
1993 Feb 21, Four days after
suspending Bosnian relief operations because of interference from
Serbs, Muslims and Croats, U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees
Sadako Ogata ordered full resumption of the aid effort. U.N.
Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali had rebuked the suspension.
(AP, 2/21/98)
1993 Feb 23, President Clinton
won United Nations support for a plan to airdrop relief supplies to
starving Bosnians during an Oval Office meeting with
Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali.
(AP, 2/23/98)
1993 Feb 25, President Clinton
ordered the Pentagon to mount an airdrop of relief supplies into
Bosnia-Herzegovina.
(AP, 2/25/98)
1993 Feb 28, Three U.S. planes
carried out the first mission to drop relief supplies over
Bosnia-Herzegovina. The US Operations Deny Flight, Provide Promise,
Deliberate Force, Decisive Edge, Joint Endeavour and others began in
Bosnia and Macedonia. They cost $9.7 billion to date in 1999 and
left 4 US casualties with 5 wounded.
(AP, 2/28/98)(WSJ, 9/22/99, p.A8)
1993 Feb, A 15-year-old girl,
later identified as FWS-87 by the UN Hague war tribunal, was
enslaved, raped and tortured by countless soldiers and then sold for
$330 on this date to two soldiers. This was during the assault on
the town of Foca in 1992-1993. In 1998 Dragoljub Kunarac (37)
pleaded guilty to raping 4 Muslim women. Testimony by FWS-75 was
provided against him.
(SFC, 6/28/96, p.A13)(SFC, 3/10/98, p.A9)
1993 Feb, The UN declared safe
areas in Serajevo and five other Muslim enclaves.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)
1993 Mar 26, President Clinton
promised a "full-court press" against Bosnian Serbs to secure their
agreement to a United Nations peace plan endorsed by Bosnian Muslims
and Croats.
(AP, 3/25/98)
1993 Apr 2, The Bosnian Serb
parliament rejected a peace plan drafted by U.N. and European
mediators and already approved by Bosnian Muslims and Croats.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1993 Apr 12, NATO warplanes
began enforcing a United Nations no-fly zone over
Bosnia-Herzegovina; meanwhile, Bosnian Serbs bombarded the besieged
eastern town of Srebrenica.
(AP, 5/9/98)
1993 Apr 13, NATO forces began
combat patrols over Bosnia to enforce a UN ban on flights.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1993 Apr 16, Bosnian Croats
took part in a killing spree in the village of Ahmici and 116
Muslims were massacred and the village set fire. 6 Bosnian Croats
went on trial in 1998 in the Hague on charges of war crimes. In 2000
Vladimir Santic, head of the Croat Jokers police unit, was sentenced
to 25 years in prison; Drago Josipovic was sentenced to 15 years;
Zoran and Mirjan Kupreskic were sentenced to 10 and 8 years, and
Vlatko Kupreskic received 6 years. In 2001 the tribunal overturned
the convictions, released 3 defendants and reduced the sentences of
2 others. In 2001 an indictment was opened against Pasko Ljubicic, a
former Bosnian-Croat military police officer, for war crimes in
Ahmici.
(SFC, 8/19/98, p.C2)(SFC, 1/15/00, p.A11)(SFC,
10/24/01, p.C2)(SFC, 11/1/01, p.C7)
1993 Apr 17, The U.N. Security
Council voted to tighten sanctions against Yugoslavia for its role
in the Bosnian war.
(AP, 4/17/98)
1993 Apr 18, The government of
Bosnia-Herzegovina agreed to a truce, effectively relinquishing
besieged Srebrenica. Meanwhile, Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic
threatened to boycott further U.N. peace talks if tougher sanctions
against Yugoslavia went into effect.
(AP, 4/18/98)
1993 Apr 26, President Clinton
signed an executive order imposing new economic sanctions against
Yugoslavia after the Serbian leadership in Bosnia voted against
accepting a U.N.-sponsored plan to end the war.
(AP, 4/26/98)
1993 Apr, A Bosnian army unit
massacred 16 Croatian civilians and at least 4 disarmed soldiers in
the village of Trusina.
(SFC, 4/14/11, p.A5)
1993 May 15, Bosnian Serbs
began voting in a two-day referendum that overwhelmingly rejected a
U.N.-backed peace plan.
(AP, 5/15/98)
1993 May 16, A two-day Bosnian
Serb referendum on a U.N.-backed peace plan ended, with voters
rejecting the proposal by a wide margin.
(AP, 5/16/98)
1993 May 22, The United States,
Russia, France, Britain and Spain agreed to enforce safe areas in
Bosnia-Herzegovina, but stopped short of endorsing President
Clinton's proposal to use military force.
(AP, 5/22/98)
1993 Jun 1, A mortar attack on
a holiday soccer game in a suburb of Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina,
killed at least 15 people and wounded more than 80.
(AP, 6/1/98)
1993 Jun 4, The U.N. Security
Council agreed to send up to 10,000 more U.N. peacekeepers to six
Bosnian cities to protect Muslim havens.
(AP, 6/4/98)
1993 Jun, The UN Security
Council voted with 2 abstentions to authorize the use of air strikes
by the US and its allies against Serb forces in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Gen. Colin Powell vigorously opposed US military intervention.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SSFC, 12/17/00, p.A15)
1993 Jun, NATO offered close
air support to UN troops in Bosnia.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1993 Jul 30, Bosnia's outgunned
Muslim-led government abandoned its efforts to hold the region
together, agreeing to a preliminary accord to divide the former
Yugoslav republic into three ethnic states.
(AP, 7/30/98)
1993 Sep 29, Bosnia's
parliament spurned an international peace plan, voting
overwhelmingly to reject it unless Bosnian Serbs returned land taken
by force.
(AP, 9/29/98)
1993 Nov 9, In Bosnia after two
days of concentrated cannon fire at point-blank range, the bridge at
Mostar finally collapsed into the river. Bosnian Serb armed militia
(BSA) fired on a school in Sarajevo and 9 children died.
(www.haverford.edu/relg/sells/killing.html)(www.hri.org/docs/USSD-Rights/93/Bosnia93.html)
1993 Robert Kaplan published
"Balkan Ghosts: A Journey Through History."
(WSJ, 8/3/99, p.A20)
1993 A Bosnian Croat state,
Herzeg-Bosnia, was declared by Croat nationalists during fighting
between Muslims and Croats. In Croat controlled parts of Bosnia it
collected taxes, ran schools and allowed use of Croatia’s currency.
(SFC, 6/15/96, p.A10)
1993 Bosnian Croat forces
campaigned to drive Muslims out of the Lasva River Valley. A Muslim
female was raped during interrogation at Vitez in the presence of
paramilitary chief Anto Furundzija. He was convicted Dec 10, 1998,
by the Yugoslav War Crimes Tribunal and sentenced to 10 years.
(SFC, 12/11/98, p.D3)(SFC, 7/22/00, p.C1)
1993 Fikret Abdic declared
Bihac an autonomous province. He and his followers fled to Croatia
in 1995. He was indicted in 1999 for inhumane treatment of civilians
and prisoners of war.
(SFC, 1/11/99, p.A10)
1993-1994 Members of the Canadian 12th Armored
Regiment were assigned to protect the Bakovici mental hospital in
Bosnia. Later 57 members were accused of various abuses that
included sex, drinking, and patient abuse.
(SFC, 1/18/96, p.A8)
1993-1994 Mladen Naletilic commanded a gang of
convicts who terrorized Muslims in southwestern Bosnia. In 2000
Croatia handed over Naletilic, a Bosnian Croat indicted in 1998 on
17 counts of war crimes, to the UN tribunal.
(SFC, 3/22/00, p.A12)
1994 Feb 5, Sixty-eight people
were killed when a mortar shell exploded in the Markale marketplace
in Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)(AP,
2/5/99)
1994 Feb 6, A day after a
mortar shell killed 68 people in a Sarajevo marketplace, President
Clinton called for a United Nations probe.
(AP, 2/6/99)
1994 Feb 9, NATO delivered an
ultimatum to Bosnian Serbs to remove heavy guns encircling Sarajevo,
or face air strikes. Hours before the ultimatum was issued, the
Bosnian Serbs agreed to withdraw their artillery and mortars from
around Sarajevo.
(AP,
2/9/99)(www.fas.org/man/gao/nsiad-95-148.htm)
1994 Feb 13, Dusan Tadic was
arrested by German police in Munich after he was recognized by
refugees from the Omarska and Trnopolje prison camps.
(SFC, 1/27/00, p.A13)
1994 Feb 17, Bosnian Serbs
began large-scale withdrawal of its heavy guns from the hills around
Sarajevo under pressure from Russia.
(AP, 2/17/99)
1994 Feb 19, With Bosnian Serbs
facing a NATO deadline to withdraw heavy weapons encircling Sarajevo
or face air strikes, President Clinton delivered an address from the
Oval Office reaffirming the ultimatum.
(AP, 2/19/99)
1994 Feb 20, Bosnian Serbs,
faced with the threat of air strikes, pulled back most of their
heavy guns from around Sarajevo as a NATO deadline approached.
(AP, 2/20/99)
1994 Feb 21, With Bosnian Serbs
complying with a NATO ultimatum to remove heavy guns near Sarajevo,
President Clinton promised renewed efforts to help "reinvigorate the
peace process."
(AP, 2/21/99)
1994 Feb 23, Military chiefs of
Bosnia's Muslim-led government and their second-strongest foes,
Bosnia's Croats, signed a truce.
(AP, 2/23/99)
1994 Feb 28, Two U.S. F-16
fighter jets downed four Serb warplanes that U.N. officials said had
bombed an arms plant run by Bosnia's Muslim-led government. This was
the first NATO use of force in the troubled area.
(AP, 2/28/99)(HN, 2/28/99)
1994 Mar 18, Bosnian Muslims
and Croats agreed to a federation between them and confederation
with Croatia in an agreement brokered by the US. Pres. Tudjman of
Croatia approached US diplomats about possible arms shipments from
Iran.
(AP, 3/18/04)(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SFC,10/16/97,
p.A12)
1994 Mar 26, U.N. peacekeepers
in Bosnia-Herzegovina destroyed a Serb bunker following a seven-hour
exchange of fire.
(AP, 3/26/99)
1994 Mar 30, Serbs and Croats
signed a cease-fire to end their war in Croatia while Bosnian
Muslims and Serbs continued to battle each other.
(AP, 3/30/99)
1994 Mar, Pres. Clinton tacitly
approved covert Iranian arms shipments to Bosnia despite a UN
arms embargo.
(SFC, 4/5/96, p.A-1) (WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)
1994 Apr 9, Bosnian Serbs by
this time had mounted an aggressive assault on Gorazde and pounded
its 65,000 citizens with heavy artillery.
(SFC, 7/15/96, p.A10)
1994 Apr 9, Secretary-General
Boutros Boutros-Ghali ordered U.N. troops to use "all available
means" to roll back Serb military gains in the Muslim enclave of
Gorazde, Bosnia.
(AP, 4/9/99)
1994 Apr 10, Two U.S. F-16
fighters bombed Bosnian Serb targets in Gorazde, which was under
heavy attack. This was NATO's first-ever attack on ground positions.
A second air strike took place the following day.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)(AP, 4/10/99)
1994 Apr 16, Bosnian Serbs
downed a British Sea Harrier jet near Gorazde; the pilot ejected and
was rescued by Bosnian government troops.
(AP, 4/16/99)
1994 Apr 17, Bosnian Serb tanks
entered the Muslim enclave of Gorazde; the UN Security Council
issued a nonbinding statement that condemned the Serbs' escalating
military activities, but made no threat of force to back its
condemnation.
(AP, 4/17/99)
1994 Apr 20, The Serbian army
bombed Gorazde, Bosnia, and the local hospital was hit.
(www.snd-us.com/history/dolecek/dolecek_accuse.htm)
1994 Apr 24, Bosnian Serbs,
threatened with NATO air strikes, grudgingly gave up their
three-week assault on Gorazde, burning houses and blowing up a water
treatment plant as they withdrew.
(AP, 4/24/99)
1994 May, Bosnian offensives
opened a road near Tuzla.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)
1994 Jun 8, Bosnia's warring
factions agreed to a one-month cease-fire.
(AP, 6/8/99)
1994 Jul 4, The United States
opened its embassy in Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, with a Fourth of
July party.
(AP, 7/4/99)
1994 Jul 20, Bosnian Serbs
rejected an international peace plan sponsored by the United States,
Russia, France, Britain and Germany.
(AP, 7/20/99)
1994 Jul 27, Bosnian Serbs
reimposed their blockade of Sarajevo and fired on a U.N. convoy,
killing one British soldier and wounding another.
(AP, 7/27/99)
1994 Aug 2, Serbia threatened
to cut all aid to the Bosnian Serbs if they didn't approve an
international peace plan.
(AP, 8/2/99)
1994 Aug 4, Serb-dominated
Yugoslavia withdrew its support for Bosnian Serbs, sealing the
300-mile border between Yugoslavia and Serb-held Bosnia.
(AP, 8/4/99)
1994 Aug 29, At the end of a
weekend referendum, Bosnian Serbs overwhelmingly rejected what was
billed as a last-chance peace plan.
(AP, 8/29/99)
1994 Oct, Bosnian forces
defeated the Serbs near Bihac.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)
1994 Nov 19, The U.N. Security
Council, anxious to stop Serb attacks on the "safe area" of Bihac in
northwest Bosnia, authorized NATO to bomb rebel Serb forces striking
from neighboring Croatia.
(AP, 11/19/99)
1994 Nov 25, NATO warplanes
buzzed the besieged "safe haven" of Bihac in northwest Bosnia but
did not carry out airstrikes against rebel Serbs.
(AP, 11/25/99)
1994 Nov 27, US Defense
Secretary William Perry, appearing on NBC's "Meet the Press,"
suggested the Bosnian government had lost the war in the Balkans,
and acknowledged NATO was powerless to stop the Serbs.
(AP, 11/27/04)
1994 Nov, The Bosnian forces
were on the offensive on three fronts and were joined by the Croat
militias.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)
1994 Dec 3, Rebel Serbs in
Bosnia failed to keep a pledge to release hundreds of U.N.
peacekeepers, some already held for more than a week.
(AP, 12/3/99)
1994 Dec 4, Bosnian Serbs
released 53 of some 400 U.N. peacekeepers held as insurance against
further NATO airstrikes.
(AP, 12/4/99)
1994 Dec 8, Bosnian Serbs
released dozens of hostage peacekeepers, but continued to detain
about 300 others.
(AP, 12/8/99)
1994 Dec 14, Bosnian Serb
leader Radovan Karadzic asked former U.S. President Jimmy Carter to
mediate a lasting peace in Bosnia.
(AP, 12/14/02)
1994 Dec 18, Former U.S.
president Jimmy Carter arrived in Bosnia-Herzegovina on a private
mission to seek an end to 32 months of war.
(AP, 12/18/99)
1994 Dec 19, Former President
Jimmy Carter, on a peace mission to Bosnia-Herzegovina, met with
Bosnian Serb leaders, who offered a four-month cease-fire.
(AP, 12/18/99)
1994 Dec 20, Former President
Jimmy Carter succeeded in getting Bosnia's warring factions to agree
to a temporary cease-fire.
(AP, 12/20/99)
1994 Dec 23, Bosnian Serbs and
the Muslim-led government agreed to a week-long truce beginning the
next day as they worked on details of a four-month cease-fire.
(AP, 12/23/99)
1994 Dec 31, Bosnian government
officials and Bosnian Serb leaders signed a U.N.-brokered cease-fire
agreement.
(AP, 12/31/99)
1994 Noel Malcolm published
"Bosnia: A Short History."
(WSJ, 5/5/98, p.A20)
1994 US Pres. Clinton assigned
Richard Holbrooke, ambassador in Germany, to be in charge of
European Affairs at the State Dept. This meant that he was to handle
affairs concerning Bosnia.
(SFEC, 8/16/98, BR p.9)
1994 The area of the world
being mined most heavily is the war zone of the former Yugoslavia,
where 3 million mines have been laid in just a few years.
(UNICEFF Mailer,11/94)
1994-1995 Depleted uranium shells were used by
NATO forces against Bosnian Serb positions around Serajevo.
(WSJ, 1/11/00, p.A14)
1995 Jan 1, In Bosnia a four
month truce between the Bosnian Serbs and the Bosnian government was
brokered by former Pres. Jimmy Carter.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 Jan, Bosnian Serb leader
Radovan Karadzic reportedly made contact with an arms dealer,
Nikolas Oman, to buy a secret nuclear device of red mercury for $6
million cash and an additional $60 million from the mortgage of a
state-owned refinery.
(SFEC,12/14/97, p.A25)
1995 Jan, British Lieutenant
General Rupert Smith, UN commander in Bosnia, arrived in the Bosnian
capital and set up an intelligence cell.
(SFC, 6/4/96, p.A12)
1995 Feb 13, The Hague War
Crimes Tribunal indicted 21 Serbs. Zeljko Meakic, Bosnian Serb
police officer, was charged with commanding the Serb Omarska camp in
northwest Bosnia. Dusan Tadic, Bosnian Serb cafe owner, was charged
for visiting Serb-run camps to beat and kill non-Serb inmates.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SFC, 11/30/96, p.A15)
1995 Mar 20, The Bosnian army,
having gained strength despite an arms embargo, launched a major
offensive in the northeast against Serb positions.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 Mar 1, The Bosnian Serb
government received a $60 million mortgage for the oil refinery in
Srpski Brod from a Liberian-owned company, Orbal Marketing Service
Ltd.
(SFEC,12/14/97, p.A25)
1995 Mar, Delivery was made to
the Bosnian Serbs in late March of a supposed nuclear device of red
mercury at the Gradiska border. It was discovered to be a swindle.
(SFEC,12/14/97, p.A25)
1995 Apr, The intelligence cell
of Gen. Smith determined that Mladic was preparing for a major push
to seize the 3 eastern safe areas: Srebrenica, Zepa and Gorazde.
(SFC, 6/4/96, p.A12)
1995 May 1, The Croatian army
captured the Serb enclave of Western Slavonia in its first major bid
to retake occupied territories. In reply the Krajina Serbs launched
a rocket attack on Zagreb, the Croatian capital. Milan Martic,
Croatian Serb leader of rebel Serb forces, ordered the shelling of
Zagreb.
(SFC, 11/30/96, p.A15)(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 May 24, Gen. Janvier told
the UN Security Council that the Bosnian government forces were
sufficient to defend Srebrenica, that UN troops should be withdrawn
and that NATO air power was not needed.
(SFC, 6/4/96, p.A12)
1995 May 25, NATO warplanes
struck Bosnian Serb headquarters. Serbs answered with swift
defiance, storming UN weapons depots, attacking safe areas and
taking peacekeepers as hostages.
(AP, 5/25/00)
1995 May 26, Serbs bombarded
Serajevo. On Jun 6 NATO launched 2 air raids against an ammunition
dump in Serb-held central Bosnia.
(SFC, 6/7/96, p.A10)(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 May 27, In Bosnia General
Mladic launched an assault against the UN observation point of the
Vrbanja bridge. French soldiers Marcel Amaru and Jacky Humboldt were
killed in the operation of liberating the Vrbanja Bridge under siege
in Sarajevo. They became the symbol of the 84 French soldiers, who
gave their lives for Bosnia.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UNPROFOR)(http://tinyurl.com/qdsxo)
1995 May 28, Bosnia’s foreign
minister and three colleagues were killed when rebel Serbs shot down
their helicopter.
(AP, 5/28/00)
1995 May 30, In a letter to UN
Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, Bosnian Serb leader Radovan
Karadzic demanded guarantees of no further NATO air attacks and de
facto recognition of a self-styled Serb state.
(AP, 5/30/00)
1995 May, The Croatian Army
overran Pakrac and some 4,100 Serbs were never heard from again.
(WSJ, 8/1/96 p.A15)
1995 Jun 2, A U.S. Air Force
F-16C was shot down by Bosnian Serbs while on a NATO air patrol in
northern Bosnia; the pilot, Capt. Scott F. O'Grady, was rescued six
days later.
(AP, 6/2/97)
1995 Jun 3, Mladic forces
seized a Dutch observation post.
(SFC, 6/4/96, p.A12)
1995 Jun 4, French General
Bernard Janvier, supreme UN military commander in the former
Yugoslavia, met with Bosnian Serb military commander, Ratko Mladic.
He pleaded for the release of UN captives and offered to halt future
NATO air attacks.
(SFC, 6/7/96, p.A10)
1995 Jun 6, NATO launched 2 air
raids against an ammunition dump in Serb-held central Bosnia.
The air strikes touched off a crises in which [270] 350 UN
peacekeepers were taken hostage by Bosnian Serbs. Serb forces seized
270 UN peacekeepers, shackled them to potential targets, and ordered
them to plead on camera for the NATO air attacks to stop. Serbia
improved its relations with the West by helping to arrange the
release of the hostages.
(SFC, 6/7/96, p.A10)(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 Jun 8, U.S. Air Force
pilot Captain Scott O'Grady was rescued by U.S. Marines after
surviving alone in Bosnia after his F-16 fighter was shot down.
(HN, 6/8/99)
1995 Jun 9, UN representative
Akashi summoned Gens. Janvier and Smith to resolve their differences
over military policies in Bosnia. Shortly after Yasushi Akashi
publicly affirmed that the UN would abide by peacekeeping principles
- shorthand for no more air attacks.
(SFC, 6/4/96, p.A10,12)
1995 Jun 16, Bosnian government
forces aided by Bosnian Croats unleashed a major offensive in hopes
of breaking the Serb stranglehold on Sarajevo.
(AP, 6/16/00)
1995 Jun 18, The Bosnian Serbs
announced the resumption of cooperation with the UN. The UN hostages
in Bosnia were freed. A planned NATO air strike was vetoed.
(SFC, 6/4/96,
p.A12)(www.washington-report.org/backissues/0995/9509111.htm)
1995 Jul 6, At 3:15AM The UN
safe area at Srebrenica came under attack by the Bosnian Serb army’s
Drina corps under Genl. Radislav Krstic, and some 7,500 Muslim men
and boys were killed. The acquisition and delivery of arms was
organized by Yugoslav army officer Mirko Krajisnik, brother to
Momcilo Krajisnik, president of the Bosnian Serb assembly. In 1998
Chuck Sudetic published "Blood and Vengeance: One Family’s Story of
the War in Bosnia." The book focused on the Srebrenica killings. 300
Dutch troops were later accused of not preventing the Serbs from
overrunning the town. Bosnian Serb Gen’l. Radislav Krstic was
arrested in 1998 for genocide in the 1995 takeover of Srebrenica. In
1999 the UN issued a 155-page report that admitted its failure to
block the massacre. Krstic was convicted in 2001. In 2003 Bosnian
Serb officers Momir Nikolic and Dragan Obrenovic described the
massacre as a well-planned and deliberate killing operation. In 2003
An Int'l. Court sentenced Col. Dragan Obrenovic (40) to 17 years in
prison for his role in the slaughter of more than 7,000 men and boys
in Srebrenica.
(SFC, 6/4/96, p.A12)(SFC, 8/12/98, p.A14)(SFC,
12/3/98, p.A16)(SFC, 11/16/99, p.A1)(SFC, 3/14/00, p.A10)(SFC,
8/3/01, p.A1)(SSFC, 10/11/03, p.A14)(AP, 12/11/03)
1995 Jul 7, UN military
observers appealed to the UN to "stop the carnage and damage in a UN
declared safe zone."
(SFC, 6/4/96, p.A12)
1995 Jul 8, Shelling resumed
and the Dutch abandoned 3 posts under direct fire. 30 Dutch troops
were taken by the Serbs to Bratunac.
(SFC, 6/4/96, p.A12)
1995 Jul 9, The Dutch again
asked for air support but it was refused.
(SFC, 6/4/96, p.A12)
1995 Jul 11, Srebrenica, a UN
declared "safe area," fell to the Bosnian Serbs. 7,000 Muslim men
supposedly escaped but were never heard from again. Drazen Erdemovic
(24) later admitted that he participated in killing 70 men at
Srebrenica. Victims were shot in the back in groups of 10 by himself
and fellow soldiers in the Bosnian Serb Army’s 10th Sabotage
Detachment. He was told that he would be killed if he refused to
follow orders. In 1998 the book "The Graves: Srebrenica and Vukovar"
was published with photographs by Gilles Peress and text by Eric
Stover.
(SFC, 6/4/96, p.A12)(SFC, 7/7/96, A10) (SFC,
6/1/96, p.A10)(SFEC, 12/20/98, BR p.6)
1995 Jul 11, Videotape showed
Gen. Ratco Mladic entering Srebrenica.
(SFC, 7/4/96, p.A8)
1995 Jul 11-1995 Jul 16,
In the Srebrenica Massacre buses arrived to take women and children
to Muslim territory, while the Serbs began separating out all men
from age 12 to 77 for "interrogation for suspected war crimes". It
is estimated that 23,000 women and children were deported in the
next 30 hours while hundreds of men were held in trucks and
warehouses. On 13 July killings of unarmed Muslims took place in one
such warehouse in the nearby village of Kravica. By July 16 Early
reports of massacres emerged as the first survivors of the long
march from Srebrenica began to arrive in Muslim-held territory.
Between July 11 and July 16 more than 7,000 unarmed Muslim men are
thought to have been killed by Serbian forces.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/675945.stm)
1995 Jul 12, In Bosnia Momir
Nikolic, an intelligence officer, was nearby when 80-100 prisoners
were decapitated and their headless corpses loaded onto trucks.
Nikolic was arrested in 2002 on charges that he was responsible for
the killing of some 1,000 Muslim males (16-60), who were taken from
a UN compound in Jul 1995. He was also charged for the deaths of
6,000 more prisoners captured while fleeing from Srebrenica. In 2003
Nikolic pleaded guilty to war crimes. In 2003 Nikolic accepted that
he was on duty when 80-100 prisoners were decapitated and their
corpses loaded onto trucks. Prosecutors recommended 20 years in
prison.
(SFC, 4/4/02, p.A8)(AP, 5/6/03)(AP, 10/28/03)
1995 Jul 16, Early reports of
massacres in Bosnia emerged as the first survivors of the long march
from Srebrenica began to arrive in Muslim-held territory. Following
negotiations between the UN and the Bosnian Serbs, the Dutch were at
last permitted to leave Srebrenica, leaving behind weapons, food and
medical supplies.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/675945.stm)
1995 Jul 21, At a 16-nation
conference in London, the United States and NATO allies warned
Bosnian Serbs that further attacks on UN safe havens would draw a
"substantial and decisive response."
(AP, 7/21/00)
1995 Jul 21, Dusko Sikirica,
Bosnian Serb, was indicted for genocide by the UN War Crimes
Tribunal for running the Serb Keraterm camp in northwest Bosnia in
1992.
(SFC, 11/30/96, p.A15)
1995 Jul 23, The United Nations
ordered the first combat unit from its rapid reaction force to
Sarajevo to take out any rebel Serb guns that fire at U.N.
peacekeepers.
(AP Internet 7/23/97)
1995 Jul 25, Two weeks after
overrunning Srebrenica, Bosnian Serbs took over the safe area of
Zepa.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14) (SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 Jul 25, Radovan Karadzic
and Gen’l. Ratko Mladic were indicted for genocide by the UN War
Crimes Hague Tribunal for commanding forces responsible for sniping
in Serajevo and for genocide and crimes against humanity. Also
indicted was Milan Martic, Croatian Serb leader of rebel Serb
forces, for ordering the shelling of Zagreb in May ‘95.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SFC, 11/30/96, p.A15)
1995 Jul 26, The US Senate
voted 69-to-29 to unilaterally lift the UN embargo on arms shipments
to Bosnia.
(AP, 7/26/00)
1995 Jul 27, Satellite photos
revealed fresh graves in the area of Srebrenica.
(SFEC, 3/19/00, p.A30)
1995 Jul, Drazen Erdemovic
(24), an ethnic Croat, participated in killing 70 men at Srebrenica.
He later admitted that victims were shot in the back in groups of 10
by himself and fellow soldiers in the Bosnian Serb Army’s 10th
Sabotage Detachment. He was told that he would be killed if he
refused to follow orders. In Nov 1996, the UN War Tribunal sentenced
him to ten years in prison.
(SFC, 6/1/96, p.A10)
1995 Jul, Forensic experts in
1998 began exhuming 274 bodies in the village of Donja Glumina. They
were believed to be Bosnian Muslims killed in Srebrenica by Serbs in
Jul 1995.
(SFC, 10/12/98, p.A8)
1995 Jul, A UN War Crimes
Tribunal in the Hague issued indictments. Dusko Sikirica, who
commanded a camp at Prijedor in 1992 where over 3,000 Bosnian
Muslims and Croats were killed and tortured, was among the indicted.
Sikirica was arrested in 2000.
(SFC, 6/26/00, p.A12)(WSJ, 6/26/00, p.A1)
1995 Jul, Serb troops made some
video tapes of their killings. In 2005 a video was shown by the War
Crimes Tribunal that displayed the murder of 6 civilians including
Azmir Alispahic (16) on Mount Treskavica near Pale.
(AP, 6/3/05)
1995 Aug 1, NATO threatened
major air strikes if any more "safe areas" were attacked in Bosnia.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 Aug 4, Croatia launched an
offensive against Krajina and captured in days a region that Serb
rebels had held for 4 years. Most of its province of Krajina,
including the Serb stronghold Knin, was taken in a 3-day offensive.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 Aug 11, Pres. Clinton
vetoed a congressional move to end the arms embargo on Bosnia and
sent Envoy Richard Holdbrooke on a new peace mission.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 Aug 19, Three top US
diplomats heading to peace talks in Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina,
were killed when their armored vehicle plunged off a muddy road and
exploded.
(AP, 8/19/00)
1995 Aug 28, A mortar shell
tore through a crowded market in Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina,
killing 38 people and triggering NATO airstrikes against the Bosnian
Serbs. Bosnian Serb shells hit Serajevo near the main market and
killed 37 people and wounded 85 others.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)(HTNet, 8/28/99)(AP,
8/28/00)
1995 Aug 30, Bosnian Serbs gave
Serbian Pres. Slobodan Milosevic authority to negotiate for them.
The West pounded the Bosnian Serbs with artillery and air attacks in
hopes of bludgeoning them into serious peace talks.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)(AP, 8/30/00)
1995 Aug 30-31, NATO planes and
UN artillery blasted Serb targets in Bosnia in response to the
market attack in Serajevo.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 Aug, Some 200,000 Serbs
were moved from the Krajina region. More than 4,500 were killed and
some 3,000 are still listed as missing in an operation that was
directed by retired American generals through MPRI of Alexandria,
Va. About 14,000 Krajina Serbs ended up in Kosovo until 1998, when
they left as violence spread.
(WSJ, 8/1/96 p.A15)(SFC, 7/6/99, p.B1)
1995 Sep 3, Testing Serb will
the United Nations reopened a route to Sarajevo and threatened more
air attacks if the rebel stranglehold of the Bosnian capital didn’t
end.
(AP, 9/3/00)
1995 Sep 9, Bosnian Serbs
blamed UN forces for a shell that killed ten people at a Bosnian
Serb hospital the day before.
(AP, 9/9/00)
1995 Sep 14, Bosnian Serbs
agreed to move heavy weapons and tanks away from Serajevo. NATO
halted bombing in response.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 Sep 15, A Muslim-Croat
offensive won 1,500 square miles of land. More than 150,000 Serbs
fled, many to Eastern Slovenia.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 Sep 26, Bosnia’s warring
factions agreed on guidelines for elections and a future government.
(AP, 9/26/00)
1995 Sep 30, US envoy Richard
Holbrooke, trying to negotiate a Bosnian cease-fire, ended
inconclusive talks with the Sarajevo government and headed for
Belgrade to try his luck with the Serbs.
(AP, 9/30/00)
1995 Sep, The US warned Bosnia
to desist from an offensive against the Serb stronghold of Banja
Luka.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)
1995 Oct 5, Pres. Clinton
announced that a cease-fire was agreed on in Bosnia to start on Oct
10, and that combatants would attend talks in the US. Bosnia’s
combatants agreed to a 60-day cease-fire and new talks on ending
their three and a-half years of battle.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)(AP, 10/5/00)
1995 Oct 11, A cease-fire was
declared in Bosnia.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)
1995 Oct 12, After a 2-day
delay, a cease-fire in Bosnia went into effect a minute after
midnight. Fighting continued over contested towns in northwest
Bosnia.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 Oct 16, Bosnian Serb
leader Karadzic fired four generals for battlefield losses. Appeals
were made to Serbian leader Milosevic for protection.
(WSJ, 10/17/95, A1)
1995 Oct 16-1995 Oct 18,
Richard Holbrooke and other international mediators met in Moscow
and traveled to the main capitals of the former Yugoslavia. The US
named the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio, as the
site for the peace talks.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 Nov 1, Peace talks for the
countries of the former Yugoslavia were launched in Dayton, Ohio.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)
1995 Nov 7, Mile Mrksic,
Miroslav Radic, and Veselin Sljivan-Canin, officers in the Yugoslav
National Army, were indicted for genocide by the UN War Crimes
Tribunal for ordering the massacre of 261 Croats taken out of a
Vukovar hospital in 1991.
(SFC, 11/30/96, p.A15)
1995 Nov 10, Dario Kordic,
ex-chairman of the Croatian Party in Bosnia, and Gen’l. Tihomir
Blaskic, former leader of the Bosnian Croat militia, were indicted
for genocide by the UN War Crimes Tribunal for commanding forces
responsible that killed hundreds of Muslims in Central Bosnia in
1992-93.
(SFC, 11/30/96, p.A15)
1995 Nov 16, Radovan Karadzic
and Gen’l. Ratko Mladic were again indicted for genocide by the UN
War Crimes Tribunal for ordering the slaughter of Muslims after the
takeover of Srebrenica.
(SFC, 11/30/96, p.A15)
1995 Nov 21, The Dayton Peace
Accord, was initialed by the leaders of Bosnia, Croatia and Serbia.
US Sec. of State, Warren Christopher and chief mediator Richard
Holbrooke manage to keep the parties talking for over 3 weeks to
reach this agreement to end three and a-half years of ethnic
fighting in Bosnia-Herzegovina. One year deployment of 20,000 US
troops as one-third of a NATO peace keeping force was estimated to
cost about $1.5 bil. The US also planned to contribute $600 mil over
three years to help rebuild Bosnia.
(WSJ, 11/22/95, p.A1,3)(SFC, 10/6/00, p.A19)(AP,
11/21/00)
1995 Nov 23, Bosnian Serb
leader Radovan Karadzic grudgingly accepted the US-backed peace plan
for the former Yugoslavia after meeting with Serbian President
Slobodan Milosevic.
(AP, 11/23/00)
1995 Nov 24, Bosnian Serb
leader Radovan Karadzic promised during a televised address to
accept a U-S-brokered peace plan.
(AP, 11/24/00)
1995 Nov 26, Senior US
officials declared the Dayton treaty on Bosnia was final, rejecting
demands from Bosnian Serbs that provisions relating to the future of
Sarajevo be changed.
(AP, 11/26/05)
1995 Nov, Top Bosnian Serb
leaders were indicted by a UN war crimes tribunal. The charges were
the second set leveled against Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic.
(WSJ, 11/17/95, p.A-1)
1995 Dec 4, In a near-freezing
drizzle, the first NATO troops landed in the Balkans to begin
setting up a peace mission that brought American soldiers into the
middle of the Bosnian conflict.
(AP, 12/4/00)
1995 Dec 7, 5000 Serbs
protested in Serajevo against the US brokered peace accord. They
were opposed to control by the Bosnian-Croat federation.
(WSJ, 12/8/95, p.A-1)
1995 Dec 14, An agreement for
peace in Bosnia, reached at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in
Dayton, Ohio, was formally signed. Presidents Alija Izetbegovic of
Bosnia, Slobodan Milosevic of Serbia and Franjo Tudjman of Croatia
signed the Bosnian peace treaty in Paris. The agreement divided
Bosnia into 2 autonomous territories and granted 51% of Bosnia to
the Muslim-Croat federation and 49% to the Serbs (Republika Srpska).
Elections were scheduled and a force of 60,000 Western troops was
planned for deployment. A 3-member presidency and a national
parliament was also part of the plan. The office of High
Representative was created to oversee the implementation of the
civilian aspects of the Peace Agreement.
(SFC, 1/19/98, p.A8)(SFC, 9/22/98, p.A8)(AP,
12/14/00)(www.ohr.int/)
1995 Dec 20, In
Bosnia-Herzegovina, NATO began its peacekeeping mission, taking over
from the United Nations.
(AP, 12/20/00)
1995 Dec 31, The first US tanks
crossed a pontoon bridge over the Sava River from Croatia to Bosnia
to start the deployment of 20,000 US troops under IFOR, the
Implementation Force under NATO command.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)
1995 Dec 31, Bosnian government
officials and Bosnian Serb leaders signed a UN-brokered cease-fire
agreement.
(AP, 12/31/00)
1995 Dec, The Sarajevo
government decreed in a law that any Sarajevo residents who were
outside the city had seven days to reclaim their homes if they were
in Bosnia and 14 days if they were out of the country.
(SFC, 6/1/96, p.A10)
1995 The US Predator
surveillance drone was 1st used over Bosnia. In 2001 it was equipped
with the hell-fire missile and used over Afghanistan. This unmanned
aerial vehicle (UAV) flew as slowly as a Cessna.
(SFC, 11/23/01, p.A12)(Econ, 12/8/07, TQ p.22)
1996 Jan 19, The Bosnian peace
agreement suffered its first setback as a planned nationwide
prisoner release fell far short of its goal.
(AP, 1/19/01)
1996 Feb, Bosnian President
Izetbegovic was accused of detaining Serbian military officers not
sought by the war crimes tribunal.
(WSJ, 2/16/96, p.A-1)
1996 Feb, Serbs withdrew from
the suburbs of Serajevo.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)
1996 Mar 14, The US approved
arms and equipment for Bosnia. It was the same day that the UN
embargo on small arms for the region was lifted. In the following
weeks M-16 rifles, machine guns, field phone systems, and military
radio equipment arrived in Bosnia.
(SFC, 5/24/96, p.A12)
1996 Apr 1, Muslim and Croat
officials signed an accord to jointly collect customs duties and
agreed on a flag.
(WSJ, 4/1/96, p.A-1)
1996 Apr 13-1996 Apr 14,
Representatives of 55 nations met in Brussels and pledged to raise
$1.2 billion for the reconstruction of Bosnia. Serbs refused to
attend as part of a delegation with Muslims and Croats.
(WSJ, 4/16/96, p.A-1)
1996 May 7, The first
international war crimes proceeding since Nuremberg opened at The
Hague in the Netherlands, with a Serbian police officer, Dusan
Tadic, facing trial on murder-torture charges. Tadic was convicted
of crimes against humanity but acquitted of murder on May 7, 1997.
In 2000 the Tadic case ended with the sentence reduced to 20 years
from 25.
(AP, 5/7/97)(SFC, 5/8/97, p.C2)(SFC, 1/27/00,
p.A13)
1996 May 15, Bosnian Serb
leader Radovan Karadzic sacked a moderate rival, Rajko Kasagic, who
supported compromise and negotiation. Kasagic had just been
appointed a few months ago as "premier" of the Bosnian Serb
Republic.
(SFC, 5/16/96, p.A-8)
1996 May 18, Biljana Plavsic
(66), vice president of the Bosnian Serbs’ self-proclaimed republic,
was chosen by Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic to be his
representative to the international community.
(SFC, 5/21/96, p.A-12)
1996 May 18, A vote to replace
Kasagic with Gojko Klickovic was passed by the joint meeting of the
so-called parliamentary Deputies Club, which convened in the ruling
party’s stronghold in Pale, Bosnia.
(SFC, 5/18/96, p.A-8)
1996 May 30, UN officials
confirmed the statement of Prime Minister Hasan Muratovic that
Bosnian Serbs were expelling Muslims from the Teslic area in central
Bosnia.
(SFC, 5/31/96, E1)
1996 Jun 14, Leaders of Serbia,
Croatia and Bosnia signed an agreement to reduce arsenals of heavy
weapons.
(WSJ, 6/17/96, p.A1)
1996 Jun 16, Croats in Mostar
named Pero Markovic as the new president of Herzeg-Bosnia.
(SFC, 6/15/96, p.A10)
1996 Jun 16, Members of a
Muslim party beat former Prime Minister Haris Silajdzic during a
northern Bosnia political rally. Leaders of Serbia, Croatia and
Bosnia signed an agreement to reduce arsenals of heavy weapons.
(WSJ, 6/17/96, p.A1)
1996 Jul 19, In Bosnia Radovan
Karadzic agreed to give up political power after negotiations led by
US envoy Richard Holbrooke.
(SFC, 7/20/96, p.A8)
1996 Aug 27, The municipal
elections scheduled for Sep 14 were cancelled by the American
diplomat Robert Frowick due to widespread abuse of rules and
regulations.
(SFC, 8/28/96, p.A8)
1996 Sep 17, In Bosnia Alija
Izetbegovic led the polls to become chairman of the new 3-member
presidency. Serbian nationalist Momcilo Krajisnik and Croat
nationalist Kresimir Zubak won their respective regions.
(SFC, 9/18/96, p.A1)(WSJ, 9/20/96, p.A10)
1996 Sep 29, The organization
that supervised Bosnia's first postwar elections officially
certified the results -- with victories by nationalist parties and
the country's Muslim president, Alija Izetbegovic.
(AP, 9/29/97)
1996 Sep, Iran delivered at
least $500,000 to Bosnian Pres. Alija Izetbegovic for his campaign.
(SFC, 12/31/96, p.A10)
1996 Oct 22, Municipal
elections were postponed till the spring because Bosnian Serbs clung
to their decision to boycott the vote.
(SFC, 10/23/96, p.A8)
1996 Oct 25, The US held back
$100 million in arms until Bosnia cuts its ties to Iran. M-60 tanks,
M-111 armored personnel carriers and 50,000 small arms, ammunition
and supplies were part of the deal.
(SFC, 10/28/96, p.A10)
1996 Nov 8, Bosnian Serb Pres.
Biljana Plavsic announced that he had dismissed General Ratko
Mladic.
(SFC, 11/9/96, p.A12)
1996 Nov 19, The Muslim-Croat
government fired Deputy Defense Minister Hasan Cengic. His ties to
Iran interfered with a $100 million US disbursement of arms. He was
replaced by an executive order of Kresimir Zubak, president of the
Muslim-Croat federation.
(SFC, 11/20/96, p.C6)
1996 Nov 27, Gen’l. Ratko
Mladic agreed to resign. He passed authority to his deputy Gen’l.
Manojlo Milovanovich.
(SFC, 11/28/96, p.B7)
1996 Nov 28, Defense Secretary
William Perry joined U.S. soldiers in the mud and freezing rain of
Bosnia-Herzegovina to deliver a Thanksgiving message of discipline
and patience for their still-unfinished peacekeeping mission.
(AP, 11/28/97)
1996 The Int’l. Commission for
Missing Persons (ICMP) was created by the G-7 nations to help
identify victims of the 1992-1995 war.
(SFC, 12/4/01, p.A3)
1997 Feb 10, Bosnian Croat
gunmen killed a Bosnian Muslim man and wounded 22 others who were
among a crowd of some 200 trying to visit a cemetery in the divided
city of Mostar.
(WSJ, 2/11/97, p.A1)
1997 Feb 11, Bosnian Croats
evicted 26 Muslim families from the Croat half of the city of
Mostar.
(WSJ, 2/12/97, p.A1)
1997 Apr 15, The joint
presidency agreed on a new currency, a coupon with a value equal to
one German mark, or about 57 cents.
(SFC, 4/16/97, p.A12)
1997 Apr 24, A Bosnian Serb
court sentenced 3 Muslims to 20 years in prison on murder charges
for killing 4 Serb civilians in Krusev Dol, near Srebrenica, in May
1996. The men claimed to have been tortured into confessing and
denied the charges with scant defense representation.
(SFC, 4/25/97, p.A14)
1997 Jun 5, In Pale Radovan
Karadzic and Momcilo Krajisnik were reported to control the
operations of Selekt Impex and Centrex, 2 companies that control
trade in cigarettes and gasoline in the Bosnian Serb Republic.
(SFC, 6/5/97, p.C2)
1997 Jul 3, Bosnian Serb Pres.
Biljana Plavsic dissolved her parliament saying that it was taking
orders from Radovan Karadzic. Bosnian Serb Premier Gojko Klickovic
rejected the decree, though he was not empowered to do so.
(SFC, 7/4/97, p.A12)
1997 Jul 10, In Operation Tango
NATO forces captured Milan Kovacevic, a physician who was the 2nd
ranking officer in the Prijedor City Hall during the war. An attempt
to capture Simo Drljaca, a leader of local "ethnic cleansing" led to
a shootout and his death. Kovacevic died in 1998 while jailed in the
Hague.
(SFC, 7/11/97, p.A17)(WSJ, 8/3/98, p.A1)
1997 Jul 19, The Serb
Democratic Party expelled Pres. Biljana Plavsic after she threatened
to arrest Karadzic and his allies for rampant corruption.
(SFC, 7/21/97, p.A8)
1997 Aug 4, It was reported
that Croats near Jajce had driven out hundreds of Muslims who had
recently returned to their homes.
(WSJ, 8/4/97, p.A1)
1997 Aug 8, Gen’l. Eric
Shinseki, the American in charge of NATO forces in Bosnia, announced
a plan to force all paramilitary troops to disband or face arrest.
(SFC, 8/9/97, p.A9)
1997 Aug 15, The high court
ruled that Pres. Biljana Plavsic had no right to disband the
Parliament. Plavsic announced the formation of a new political
party, the Serb National Union.
(SFC, 8/16/97, p.A10)
1997 Aug 20, NATO troops in
Bosnia seized truckloads of weapons from police stations in Banja
Luka. They moved to force out officers loyal to Karadzic.
(WSJ, 8/21/97, p.A1)
1997 Aug 21, Judge Jovo Rosic
reported that he was beaten up and ordered to vote against Pres.
Plavsic last week.
(SFC, 8/22/97, p.A14)
1997 Aug 28, US troops clashed
with Bosnian Serbs in Brcko. NATO forces rescued some 50 besieged UN
police monitors as crowds, opposed to Pres. Plavsic, demanded the
expulsion of Western peacekeepers. U.S. troops fired tear gas and
warning shots to fend off rock-hurling Serb mobs. The attempt by
US-led NATO forces to install Plavsic forces in police stations in 3
cities failed.
(SFC, 8/29/97, p.A1)(SFC, 9/3/97, p.C2)(AP,
8/28/98)
1997 Sep 1, In Bosnia several
hundred Bosnian Serbs attacked some 300 armed US troops in an effort
to take back a key TV transmitter that was seized by the Americans
last week. The melee was a standoff.
(SFC, 9/2/97, p.A10)
1997 Sep 2, US troops in Bosnia
relinquished control of the TV transmitter in exchange for
agreements to permit opposition voices on the air and an end to
inflammatory rhetoric.
(SFC, 9/3/97, p.C2)
1997 Sep 13-1997 Sep 14,
Municipal elections were held under NATO escort. There was a high
voter turnout.
(SFEC, 9/14/97, p.A22)(SFC, 9/15/97, p.A10)
1997 Sep 17, A UN helicopter
crashed in Bosnia and 12 officials were killed.
(SFC, 9/18/97, p.A12)
1997 Sep 18, In Bosnia a car
bomb in Mostar injured about 50 people and destroyed 56, apartments,
9 businesses and 44 cars.
(SFC, 9/20/97, p.A10)
1997 Sep 26, A German court
convicted Nikola Jorgic, a Bosnian Serb, for leading a death squad
that killed 22 Muslims in Grapska during the war.
(SFC, 9/27/97, p.A12)
1997 Sep 26, Political
broadcasts began in Banja Luka under an agreement by rival factions
to share the airwaves on alternate days.
(SFEC, 9/28/97, p.A26)
1997 Oct 1, In Bosnia NATO
seized 4 key Bosnian Serb television transmitters.
(SFC, 10/2/97, p.A1)
1997 Oct 6, Nine Bosnian Croats
surrendered to the int’l. war crimes tribunal in the Hague. Dario
Kordic joined the group when the US promised a speedy trial to
volunteer suspects. Kordic was the leader of the Bosnian branch of
Franjo Tudjman’s Croatian Democratic Union political party, and was
charged with commanding troops who rampaged through 14 towns in the
Lasva Valley torturing and killing hundreds of Muslims and burning
their homes.
(SFC, 10/6/97, p.A11)
1997 Oct 4, It was reported
that an Egyptian ship loaded with Soviet-made T-55 tanks was sitting
at anchor in the Croatian port of Ploce. The shipment was registered
with officials of the foreign peace force. An error on the manifest
said the tanks were intended for the Bosnian Army.
(SFC, 10/4/97, p.A8)
1997 Oct 9, Bosnian Muslims won
the municipal elections in Srebrenica when refugee voters returned
to outnumber Serbs who had moved in following mass executions in
1995.
(SFC, 10/10/97, p.D5)
1997 Oct 10, Bosnian Serb
nationalists won a narrow victory in the Sept. Brcko municipal
elections. A Muslim party coalition won 14 of 24 seats in Mostar. An
int’l. supervisor, US diplomat Robert Farrand, issued an order that
the municipal administration in Brcko must reflect the prewar
multiethnic composition, and that this would extend to the police
and the judiciary.
(SFC, 10/11/97, p.A9)
1997 Oct 12, Elections were
scheduled by Pres. Plavsic.
(SFC, 8/23/97, p.A12)
1997 Oct 16, It was reported
that the US Agency for Int’l. Development donated $1 million to
Bosnian Serb Pres. Biljana Plavsic for reconstruction in Banja Luka.
(SFC,10/16/97, p.A14)
1997 Oct 16, Bosnian Serb
hard-liners launched a guerrilla-style TV broadcast and attacked the
West’s efforts to silence them.
(SFC,10/17/97, p.D2)
1997 Nov 6, In Belgrade former
Serb soldier and convict, Slobodan Misic, was arrested after he told
reporters that he had killed up to 80 Croats and Muslims near
Vukovar in eastern Croatia and in the Bratunac-Shrebrenica area of
eastern Bosnia in 1991.
(SFC,11/6/97, p.D3)
1997 Nov 15, Parliamentary
elections were scheduled under supervision by the Organization for
Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
(SFEC, 9/28/97, p.A3)
1997 Nov 22-1997 Nov 23, The
Serb Democratic Party of Radovan Karadzic won 24 seats vs. 15 seats
for the allied Radical party of Biljana Plavsic. The elections were
organized by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe
(OSCE).
(SFC,12/897, p.A18)
1997 Dec 7, Presidential
elections were scheduled under supervision by the Organization for
security and Cooperation in Europe.
(SFEC, 9/28/97, p.A3)
1997 Dec 18, In Bosnia NATO
forces seized 2 war crimes suspects. Vlatko Kupreskic was shot when
he fired on Dutch soldiers. Anto Furundzija was arrested without
trouble.
(SFC,12/19/97, p.B2)
1997 Dec 22, During his visit
to Bosnia, President Clinton thanked American troops and lectured
the nation's three presidents to set aside their differences.
(AP, 12/22/98)
1997 The film "Welcome to
Sarajevo" starred Stephen Dillane and Goran Visnjic and was directed
by Michael Winterbottom.
(www.imdb.com/title/tt0120490/)(SSFC, 12/9/01,
Par p.22)
1997 A French military officer
held secret meetings with Radovan Karadzic and foiled an Allied
forces planned attempt to capture Karadzic. US Army Gen’l. Wesley
Clark, the Supreme Allied Commander of NATO, called off the plan due
to undue risk after he learned about the secret meetings.
(SFC, 4/23/98, p.A12)
1998 Jan 18, The Bosnian Serb
Parliament named a coalition government led by Milorad Dodik, a
pro-western leader of the Independent Social Democrats.
(SFC, 1/19/98, p.A8)
1998 Jan 21, Western mediators
unveiled a common currency and ordered that it be accepted by the
Muslims, Serbs and Croats.
(SFC, 1/22/98, p.B2)
1998 Jan 22, Goran Jelisic
(29) was detained by UN peace troops in Bijeljina. An indictment
against him held that he commanded the Luka prisoner camp in Brcko
in May 1992 and killed 16 Muslims, and that he was responsible for
the deaths of countless detainees. In 1999, he was found guilty on
all counts of crimes against humanity and violating the customs of
war. He was acquitted on the charge of genocide as the court did not
believe the prosecution had proved this beyond reasonable doubt. On
May 29, 2003, Jelisic was transferred to Italy to serve the
remainder of his sentence with credit for time served since his
arrest.
(SFC, 1/22/98,
p.E2)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goran_Jelisi%C4%87)
1998 Feb 7, Government agents
arrested Goran Vasic, the suspected gunman of the 1993 murder of
deputy prime minister Hakija Turaljic. Serb hard-liners then
seized 2 UN buses, several cars and an unknown number of
Muslim hostages and demanded the release of Vasic.
(SFC, 2/7/98, p.A12)
1998 Apr 8, In Bosnia NATO
forces arrested Miroslav Kvocka and Mladen Radic, both whom were
charged for war crimes at the Omarska camp near Prijedor where
scores of Muslim and Croat prisoners were killed in 1992.
(SFC, 4/9/98, p.A12)
1998 Apr 24, Some 1500 Bosnian
Croats rioted in retaliation for a Serbian attack on Croatian Roman
Catholic Cardinal Vinko Puljic.
(SFC, 4/25/98, p.A9)
1998 May 6, Five key Karadzic
holdovers were arrested or suspended for political and economic
illegal acts.
(SFC, 5/27/98, p.A10)
1998 May, In Croatia Gojko
Susak, the Croatian Defense Minister, died of cancer. He had
directed the wartime revolt by Bosnian Croats against the Muslim-led
Bosnian government.
(SFC, 5/14/98, p.C18)
1998 Jul 25, It was reported
that the US dropped secret plans to seize Radovan Karadzic and
Gen’l. Ratko Mladic in Bosnia.
(SFEC, 7/26/98, p.A17)
1998 Sep 16, Early results from
weekend elections indicated that hard-line nationalists led with 60%
of the votes counted.
(SFC, 9/17/98, p.A12)
1998 Sep 21, In Bosnia Biljana
Plavsic conceded defeat to nationalist Nikola Poplasen. Nine
hard-line candidates were disqualified. For the presidency Serb
Zivko Radisic defeated Momcilo Karjisnik, Muslim leader Alija
Izetbegovic won, and Croat Ante Jelavic defeated Kresimir Zubak.
(SFC, 9/22/98, p.A8)(WSJ, 9/22/98, p.A1)(SFC,
9/26/98, p.A10)
1998 Oct 11, In Bosnia forensic
experts began exhuming 274 bodies in the village of Donja Glumina.
They were believed to be Bosnian Muslims killed in Srebrenica by
Serbs in Jul 1995.
(SFC, 10/12/98, p.A8)
1998 Nov 16, A UN
tribunal convicted a Bosnian Croat and 2 Muslims for murder, torture
and rape at the Celebici Camp in central Bosnia in 1992. Hazimn
Delic, deputy commander, received a 20 year sentence; Zdravko Mucic,
camp warden received 7 years; and Esad Landzo received 15 years.
(SFC, 11/17/98, p.A14)
1998 Dec 2, In Bosnia US troops
arrested Bosnian Serb Gen’l. Radislav Krstic for genocide in the
1995 takeover of Srebrenica.
(SFC, 12/3/98, p.A16)
1998 Roger Cohen published
"Hearts Grown Brutal: Sagas of Serajevo."
(SFEC, 1/10/99, BR p.5)
1998 Richard Holbrooke
published "To End a War," about his experiences in Bosnia from
1994-1996.
(SFEC, 8/16/98, BR p.9)
1998 Noel Malcolm published
"Kosovo: A Short History," a history of the troubled region and
Albania. Malcolm earlier wrote "Bosnia: A Short History."
(WSJ, 5/5/98, p.A20)(SFEC, 9/6/98, BR p.8)
1999 Jan 9, Near Foca, Bosnia,
French troops shot and killed Dragan Gagovic (38), the former police
chief of Foca and a war crimes suspect.
(SFEC, 1/10/99, p.A17)
1999 Jan 10, A warrant was
issued for the arrest of former warlord Fikret Abdic, who declared
Bihac an autonomous province in 1993. He and his followers fled to
Croatia in 1995.
(SFC, 1/11/99, p.A10)
1999 Jan 25, Bosnian Serb
legislators rejected Pres. Poplasen's choice for premier, Brane
Miljus.
(SFC, 1/26/99, p.A14)
1999 Jan 26, Some 700 US troops
were ordered by NATO to be pulled from Bosnia in a 10% force
reduction.
(WSJ, 1/27/99, p.A1)
1999 Mar 5, In Bosnia the town
of Brco was removed from ethnic Serb control and proclaimed a
neutral zone under int'l. supervision. Nikola Poplasen, president of
the Bosnian Serb Republic, was removed from office for not
cooperating with the int'l. community.
(SFC, 3/5/99, p.A12)(SFC, 3/6/99, p.A10)
1999 Mar 26, In Bulgaria some
10,000 people protested NATO strikes; in Greece some 15,000 marched
on the US embassy in protest; in Bosnia some 3,000 Serb youths
turned violent in Banja Luka over the NATO strikes.
(SFC, 3/27/99, p.A11)
1999 Mar 28, UN officials
reported that some 500,000 ethnic Albanians had fled Kosovo. NATO
officials raised the possibility of using ground troops in
Yugoslavia as low-level strikes against tanks began. It was feared
that anger over the war would spill over to Bosnia.
(SFC, 3/29/99, p.A1,10)
1999 May 14, It was reported
that 30,000 NATO troops were in Bosnia to enforce the 1995 peace
agreement.
(WSJ, 5/13/99, p.A1)
1999 May, The national
employment bureau began operations.
(SFC, 11/10/00, p.D3)
1999 Jun 20, The last Serbian
officer left Kosovo. Pres. Milosevic urged the Serbs of Kosovo to
stay in Kosovo under NATO protection. As the last or 40-thousand
Yugoslav troops rolled out of Kosovo, NATO declared a formal end to
its bombing campaign against Yugoslavia.
(SFC, 6/21/99, p.A1,7)(AP, 6/20/00)
1999 Jun 25, Bosnia's banking
agency took over the Bosnia and Herzegovina Bank which became
insolvent following a run on the bank triggered by the call in of
loans by USAID.
(SFC, 8/18/99, p.A12)
1999 Jul 6, In Bosnia British
troops seized Radoslav Brdjanin, who was charged with crimes against
Muslims and Croats around Banja Luka in 1992.
(SFC, 7/7/99, p.A10)
1999 Jul 29, In Serajevo a
2-day conference by leaders of over 60 countries was to begin for a
Balkan Stability Pact nicknamed "Marshall II."
(SFC, 7/27/99, p.A8)
1999 Jul 30, In Serajevo Pres.
Clinton pledged $700 million in aid in addition to $500 million for
Kosovo as talks began to rebuild the Balkans.
(SFC, 7/31/99, p.A6)
1999 Aug 2, In Bosnia NATO
troops arrested Radomir Kovac, former Bosnian Serb paramilitary
leader, for enslaving and raping Muslim women in 1992-1993.
(WSJ, 8/3/99, p.A1)
1999 Aug 17, In Bosnia the
Office of the High Representative, an int'l. agency for carrying out
aspects of the Dayton peace agreement, reported that as much as a
billion dollars disappeared from public funds from int'l. aid
projects. Losses were triggered when USAID called in loans from the
Bosnia and Herzegovina Bank that could not be covered.
(SFC, 8/17/99, p.A1)(SFC, 8/18/99, p.A12)
1999 Aug 25, Gen'l. Momir Talic
of Bosnia was arrested in Austria on a secret UN war crimes
indictment. Talic had commanded the 1st Krajina Corps from
1992-1995.
(SFC, 8/26/99, p.A12)
1999 Oct 12, The world
population was projected to reach 6 billion. This day was declared
by the UN as the Day of 6 Billion. The designated 6 billionth baby
was born in Bosnia.
(SFC, 6/30/99, p.A12)(SFEC, 7/11/99, p.A19)(SFC,
10/12/99, p.A10)
1999 Oct 14, In Bosnia 4 NATO
soldiers were injured as they attempted to seize weapons in the
divided city of Mostar.
(SFC, 10/15/99, p.D3)
1999 Oct 22, In Bosnia Zeljko
Kopanja, editor-in-chief of Nezavisne Novine, lost both legs due to
a bomb attack as he opened his car door. He had recently published a
series of war time atrocities committed against non-Serbs by Bosnian
and Serb forces.
(SFC, 10/23/99, p.A11)
1999 Oct 25, In Bosnia some
30,000 people streamed into Serajevo to protest for job protection
and an end to corruption.
(SFC, 10/26/99, p.B2)
1999 Oct 25, Mladen Vuksanovic,
author of "Pale, a Diary, April-July 1992," written during the first
100 days of rule by Radowan Karadzic, died at age 57 in Croatia.
(SFC, 10/26/99, p.B4)
2000 Jan 14, A UN tribunal
sentenced five Bosnian Croat militiamen to up to 25 years in prison
for a 1993 murder rampage that emptied a Bosnian village of every
one of its Muslim inhabitants.
(AP, 1/14/01)
2000 Jan 25, In Bosnia NATO
peacekeepers arrested Mitar Vasiljevic (45), a member of the White
Eagles Bosnian-Serb paramilitary group, on charges of extermination
of Bosnian Muslim civilians between 1992 and 1994. The charges
included helping to burn scores of Muslims to death in Visegrad.
(SFC, 1/26/00, p.A9)
2000 Feb, The government was
dissolved because it had 2 prime ministers.
(SFC, 6/24/00, p.A13)
2000 Mar 5, NATO peacekeeping
troops arrested Dragoljub Prcac, a Bosnian Serb, for war crimes
committed at the Omarska prison camp in 1992, where he served as
deputy commander.
(SFC, 3/6/00, p.A12)
2000 Mar 9, In Bosnia US Sec.
of state Madeleine Albright won a pledge from Croatian and Bosnian
Serb leaders to allow thousands of refugees to go home.
(SFC, 3/10/00, p.A13)
2000 Apr 3, In Bosnia NATO
troops arrested Momcilo Krajisnik, former speaker of the Bosnian
Serb assembly, for war crimes and flew him to the Netherlands to
stand trial.
(SFC, 4/4/00, p.A10)
2000 Apr 9, In Bosnia the
moderate Social Democratic party claimed victory in 20 cities of the
Muslim-Croat Federation. In the Serb Republic the Serbian Democratic
Party won 56.5% of the vote.
(SFC, 4/10/00, p.A14)
2000 Apr 11, In Bosnia 3
children were killed after they wandered into a mine field near
Serajevo.
(WSJ, 4/12/00, p.A1)
2000 Jun 22, In Bosnia a new
cabinet proposed by Prime Minister Spasoje Tusevljak won
parliamentary approval. Tusevljak, an economics professor, was
approved by parliament earlier in June.
(SFC, 6/24/00, p.A13)
2000 Sep 25, In NYC a US
District court ordered Radovan Karadzic, a former Bosnian Serb
leader, to pay $4.5 million in damages for 1992 war atrocities
committed by his soldiers.
(SFC, 9/26/00, p.A16)
2000 Oct 13, Janko "Tuta"
Janjic (43), a war crimes suspect, killed himself in Foca, a town in
the Serb section of Bosnia, when NATO troops came to arrest him.
(SFC, 10/14/00, p.A10)
2000 Oct 18, In Bosnia over
1,000 Bosnian Serb high school students rioted in Brcko and demanded
an end to the city’s multiethnic status.
(SFC, 10/19/00, p.C2)
2000 Nov 10, It was reported
that Prime Minister Edhem Bicakcic managed an illicit public fund,
the national employment bureau, that disbursed tens of millions of
tax dollars to private companies, state enterprises and veteran
subsidies.
(SFC, 11/10/00, p.D3)
2000 Nov 11, General elections
were held in Bosnia. Mirko Sarovic of the Serb Democratic Party led
over Serb Prime Minister Milorad Dodik.
(SFEC, 11/12/00, p.A24)(SFC, 11/14/00, p.A20)
2000 Nov 21, Final election
results were released. Hard-line nationalists won support among the
Serbs and Croats. Mirko Sarovic was declared the winner of the
Bosnian Serb republic over prime minister Milorad Dodik. The
ultranationalist Croatian Democratic Union was not included in the
new government.
(SFC, 11/22/00, p.C5)(SFC, 11/24/00, p.D8)(SFC,
4/21/01, p.A12)
2001 Jan 9, Biljana Plavsic,
former Bosnian Serb president, left for the Hague to appear before
the UN war crimes tribunal over her role in the 1992-1995 war.
(SFC, 1/10/01, p.A10)
2001 Feb 22, A UN tribunal on
Yugoslav War Crimes found 3 Bosnian Serbs guilty of crimes against
humanity for the rape, torture and enslavement of Muslim women in
Foca between 1992-1993. The landmark case established rape and
sexual enslavement as a crime against humanity. They were sentenced
to 28, 20 and 12 years, respectively.
(SFC, 2/23/01, p.A1)(AP, 11/1/07)
2001 Feb 26, The UN War Crimes
tribunal in the Hague convicted Dario Kordic, a former Bosnian Croat
leader, for crimes against humanity in the 1992-1995 Bosnian War.
Mario Crekez (41), a brigade commander of Croatian troops in Bosnia,
was also convicted. They had carried out an "ethnic cleansing"
campaign in an area they wished to be joined to Croatia.
(SFC, 2/27/01, p.A12)(WSJ, 2/27/01, p.A1)
2001 Mar 28, Bosnian Croat
soldiers deserted by the hundreds following orders by the
self-proclaimed Croat National Assembly led by the nationalist Croat
Democratic Union. Many returned after the defense ministry warned
that they would forfeit wages and benefits.
(SFC, 3/29/01, p.A12)
2001 Apr 6, Bosnian Croats
stoned Nato peacekeepers after police and troops seized the
Hercegovacka Banka and its 10 branches. The bank was believed to be
used by the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) to promote a separate
Croatian ministate.
(SFC, 4/7/01, p.A10)
2001 Apr 15, U.N. investigators
arrested Bosnian Serb army officer Dragan Obrenovic in connection
with the Serbian Army's slaughter of as many as 7,000 Muslim men and
boys. Obrenovic later pleaded guilty to five war crimes charges and
testified against his one-time superior officers; he was sentenced
to 17 years in prison.
(AP, 4/15/06)
2001 Apr 24, Bosnian Serbs
blocked a takeover of their part of Serajevo after an int’l. judge
gave it to the Muslim-Croat federation.
(WSJ, 4/25/01, p.A1)
2001 Jul 31, Stevan Todorovic,
a former Bosnian Serb police chief, was sentenced at the Hague to 10
years in prison for war crimes in 1992-1993. Todorovic was known as
"Monstrum" for his cruelty.
(SFC, 8/1/01, p.A8)
2001 Aug 2, The UN war crimes
tribunal found Radislav Krstic, former Bosnian Serb general, guilty
for the 1995 genocide of some 8,000 Muslim men in Srebrenica. He was
sentenced to 46 years in prison. A 2004 appeal reduced the sentence
to 35 years.
(SFC, 8/3/01, p.A1)(http://tinyurl.com/gm9l9)
2001 Aug 15, Dragan Jokic
surrendered to the UN war crimes tribunal to face charges from the
1995 Srebrenica massacre.
(WSJ, 8/16/01, p.A1)
2001 Aug 16, Col. Vidoje
Blagojevic, former commander of Bratunac, pleaded innocent at the
Hague war crimes tribunal for 1995 war crimes in Srebrenica. On
January 17, 2005, Col. Vidoje Blagojevic became the second indictee
to be convicted on Srebrenica Genocide charges and other human
rights violations. He was sentenced to 18 years in prison. On May 9,
2007, the Appeals Chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for
the former Yugoslavia ruled that Col Blagojevic had not been
complicit in the genocide at Srebrenica because he had not known his
troops intended to commit it. Blagojevic’s sentence was reduced to
15 years.
(SFC, 8/17/01,
p.A14)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Srebrenica_massacre)
2001 Oct 24, A NATO spokesman
said peacekeepers in Bosnia had disrupted a Bosnian terrorist
network.
(SFC, 10/25/01, p.A14)
2001 Dec 4, Edwin Huffine, US
forensic scientist, launched a new DNA ID software program developed
with a team of Bosnian experts at the Sarajevo-based Int’l.
Commission for Missing Persons (ICMP). The program used kinship
analysis.
(SFC, 12/4/01, p.A3)
2002 Jan 18, US forces took 6
terrorism suspects, held since October, from Bosnia after local
courts ruled that there was too little evidence to hold them. The
suspects included Bensayah Belkacem, a key European al Qaeda
lieutenant. Protesters clashed with riot police.
(SFC, 1/19/02, p.A12)(SFC, 1/23/02, p.A9)(WSJ,
3/18/02, p.A10)
2002 Mar 18, It was reported
that 94 former Arab mujahedeen had been stripped of Bosnian
citizenship and deported or forced to flee. They left some 300
Bosnian-born children behind.
(WSJ, 3/18/02, p.A10)
2002 Mar 20, The US Embassy in
Bosnia was shut down to the public due to a possible terrorist
threat.
(SSFC, 3/24/02, p.A18)
2002 Jun 30, The United States
vetoed a resolution extending the U.N. peacekeeping mission in
Bosnia, then agreed to keep the mission alive three more days while
the Security Council seeks a way to meet U.S. demands for immunity
from a new global war crimes court.
(Reuters, 6/30/02)(SFC, 7/1/02, p.A3)
2002 Jul 22, In Bosnia forensic
experts discovered a mass grave in the northeast that may contain up
to 100 bodies of Muslims killed at the end of the country's 1992-95
war.
(AP, 7/23/02)
2002 Sep 27, Lord Ashdown
(b.1941) began serving as the international community's High
Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina. He ended his term May 30,
2006.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paddy_Ashdown)
2002 Oct 2, Bosnian Serb
wartime leader Biljana Plavsic, one of the highest-ranking suspects
at the U.N. war crimes tribunal, pleaded guilty to one count of
crimes against humanity.
(AP, 10/2/02)
2002 Oct 5, In Bosnia elections
the centrist Muslim Party for Democratic Action reported the party
was in the lead following a 55% turnout. Bosnia's three nationalist
parties beat moderates in the country's first self-organized
elections since the 1992-1995 war. Postwar Bosnia is made up of two
mini-states, the Serb republic and the Muslim-Croat federation. The
two have wide powers and are linked by a joint parliament and
government. Elections provided winners with four years in office
instead of two.
(AP, 10/6/02)(AP, 10/5/03)
2003 Jan 1, In Bosnia the EU
hoisted its dark blue banner to officially mark the transfer of
peacekeeping duties from the United Nations, while NATO-led troops
handed over control of Sarajevo's airport to Bosnian authorities.
(AP, 1/1/03)
2003 Jan 17, Parliament of the
Bosnian Serb ministate approved a Cabinet and Dragan Mikerevic (48)
as the new prime minister.
(AP, 1/17/03)
2003 Feb 27, Biljana
Plavsic, the former Bosnian Serb leader who expressed remorse for
the horrors committed against non-Serbs during the Bosnian war, was
sentenced to 11 years in prison. Later this year she was transferred
to Sweden to serve her sentence.
(AP, 2/27/03)(AP, 9/15/09)
2003 Mar 7,
International officials froze assets linked to top Bosnian-Serb war
crimes fugitive Radovan Karadzic. A panel of Bosnian and int’l.
judges ordered Bosnia’s Serb Republic to pay $2.25 million in
compensation for the 1995 massacre at Srebrenica.
(AP, 3/7/03)(SFC, 3/8/03, p.A7)
2003 Mar 25, Muhamed
Sacirbegovic (46), former Bosnia ambassador to the US (1992-2000)
was arrested in NYC. The Bosnian government has accused him of
stealing more than $2.4 million, about $1.8 million from the
nation's Investment Fund Ministry and more than $600,000 from the
account of Bosnia's representation at the UN.
(AP, 3/26/03)
2003 Apr 2, Mirko Sarovic, a
Bosnian Serb who was the chairman of the country's three-member
multiethnic presidency, resigned after being implicated in a local
company's violation of the U.N. arms embargo against Iraq.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 11, NATO-led
peacekeepers in Bosnia arrested Naser Oric (35), a Bosnian Muslim
wanted by the Yugoslav war crimes tribunal and flew him to The
Hague. He was the wartime army commander in the eastern Bosnian town
of Srebrenica. In 2006 Oric was acquitted of direct involvement in
the murder of prisoners in the early years of the 1992-95 Bosnia
war. But the court found he had closed his eyes to their
mistreatment and failed to punish their killers. He was sentenced to
2 years and then ordered to be released since he has been in jail
for more than three years.
(AP, 4/11/03)(AP, 6/30/06)
2003 May 5, Momir Nikolic, a
Bosnian Serb captain and member of the Bratunac Brigade that
participated in the executions of more than 7,000 Muslim men and
boys in the Bosnian enclave of Srebrenica at the end of the
1992-1995 Bosnian war, pleaded guilty to war crimes. Nikolic was
nearby when 80-100 prisoners were decapitated and their headless
corpses loaded onto trucks on July 12, 1995.
(AP, 5/6/03)
2003 May 16, Bosnia signed an
agreement with the United States on Friday that exempts Americans
from prosecution by a new international criminal court.
(AP, 5/17/03)
2003 Jul 11, Thousands marked
the anniversary of the 1995 massacre at Srebrenica in Bosnia,
burying 282 newly identified victims.
(AP, 7/11/04)
2003 Oct 19, Alija Izetbegovic
(78) died in Sarajevo. He led Bosnia's Muslims during the 1992-95
war for independence and became one of the republic's first postwar
presidents.
(AP, 10/19/03)
2003 Oct 27, Prosecutors in the
Netherlands said Momir Nikolic (48), a Bosnian Serb captain who
admitted participating in the mass killing of more than 7,000 Muslim
boys and men in Srebrenica, should serve up to 20 years in
prison. Nikolic accepted that he was on duty when 80-100
prisoners were decapitated and their corpses loaded onto trucks on
July 12, 1995. In 2006 a UN appeals court reduced his 27-year
sentence to 20 years.
(AP, 10/28/03)(AP, 3/8/06)
2003 Oct 30, The US and 29
other countries pledged $18.4 million to create a new war crimes
court in Bosnia that will lighten the load at the U.N. tribunal in
the Netherlands.
(AP, 10/30/03)
2003 Dec 18, Dragan Nikolic
(46), former Bosnian Serb prison camp commander who allowed his
troops to rape, torture and murder his Muslim prisoners, was
sentenced to 23 years in jail at the U.N. war crimes tribunal in the
Hague.
(AP, 12/18/03)
2004 Jan 28, Bosnia's
international administrator imposed a decree to unify the ethnically
divided city of Mostar, a precondition for Bosnia to join
international organizations and perhaps even the European Union.
(AP, 1/28/04)
2004 Apr 5, Six ethnic Croats
surrendered to the U.N. war crimes tribunal to face allegations they
participated in the torture and massacre of Muslims in Bosnia in
1993.
(AP, 4/5/04)
2004 Apr 30, Bosnian Serb
authorities offered details of six previously undisclosed mass
graves in the town of Srebrenica.
(AP, 4/30/04)
2004 Jun 11, A commission of
the government of the Republika Srpska, the Serbian part of Bosnia,
finally admitted that Serbian forces were responsible for the 1995
Muslim massacre at Srebrenica.
(Econ, 6/19/04, p.53)
2004 Jul 23, In Bosnia
Britain's Prince Charles and other foreign dignitaries gathered to
reopen the Mostar bridge over the Neretva River. The original was
built in 1566.
(AP, 7/23/04)
2004 Aug 9, Forensic experts
said they found a mass grave in the waste dump of a coal mine in
eastern Bosnia, which they suspect may contain the bodies of about
350 Muslims who disappeared from a Bosnian Serb detention centre
during the Bosnian war.
(AP, 8/9/04)
2004 Nov 10, Bosnian Serb
authorities apologized for the first time to relatives of around
8,000 Muslims killed by Serb forces in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre,
Europe's worst atrocity since World War II.
(AP, 11/10/04)
2004 Nov 24, The US military
ended a 9-year peacekeeping role in Bosnia but kept on a small
contingent to hunt down top war crimes suspects Radovan Karadzic and
Ratko Mladic.
(AP, 11/24/04)
2004 Dec 2, The European Union
began its biggest-ever military operation, formally taking over
NATO's peacekeeping mission in Bosnia with 7,000 troops (EUFOR).
(AP, 12/2/04)(Econ, 3/19/05, p.60)
2004 Dec 17, Bosnian Serb Prime
Minister Dragan Mikerevic resigned, one day after the international
community imposed sanctions against Bosnian Serb police and
officials for allegedly helping fugitive war crimes suspects evade
justice.
(AFP, 12/17/04)
2005 Jan 15, Savo Todovic (52),
a Bosnian Serb wanted by the U.N. war crimes tribunal for crimes he
allegedly committed during the 1992-95 war, surrendered to Bosnian
Serb police.
(AP, 1/15/05)
2005 Oct 4, A Bosnian Serb
panel said it identified more than 17,000 people with varying levels
of blood on their hands for abetting the 1995 Srebrenica massacre.
(WSJ, 10/5/05, p.A1)
2005 Oct 17, Radovan Karadzic,
former Bosnian-Serb leader and war-crimes fugitive, released a 6th
collection of poems titled “Under the left Breast of the Century.”
(SFC, 10/19/05, p.A2)
2005 Oct 19, Police in Bosnia
arrested a cyber-jihadist who called himself Maximus. Mirsad
Bektasevic, a Swedish teenager of Bosnian extraction, was sentenced
to jail along with 3 others for plotting attacks to take place in
Bosnia or other European countries. On his computer police found
contacts with other jihadists in Europe including Younis Tsouli
(Irhabi007), whom British police arrested 2 days later.
(Econ, 7/14/07,
p.28)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irhabi_007)
2005 Oct 21, The European
Commission agreed to open talks with Bosnia on a cooperation
agreement that could lead to full EU membership for the Balkan
nation.
(AP, 10/21/05)
2005 Oct 27, In Denmark 4 young
Muslims were arrested for helping to supply weapons and explosives
for a planned terror attack in Europe. They helped two main suspects
in Bosnia get hold of weapons and explosives with the aim of
committing a terror act. In 2007 a Danish court convicted Abdul
Basit Abu-Lifa (17) and sentenced him to 7 years in jail.
(AP, 8/24/06)(AP, 2/16/07)
2005 Oct, Police in Bosnia
arrested a cyber-jihadist who called himself Maximus. Mirsad
Bektasevic, a Swedish teenager of Bosnian extraction, was sentenced
to jail along with 3 others for plotting attacks to take place in
Bosnia or other European countries. On his computer police found
contacts with other jihadists in Europe including Younis Tsouli
(Irhabi007), whom British police arrested 2 days later.
(Econ, 7/14/07, p.28)
2005 Nov 1, In Bosnia 2
children in Doribaba died when they were playing with a hand grenade
and pulled the security pin.
(AP, 11/2/05)
2005 Nov 21, EU foreign
ministers authorized the start of negotiations on an agreement to
prepare Bosnia for EU membership a decade after the Balkan nation
was ravaged by Europe's worst fighting since World War II. Leaders
of Bosnia's three major ethnic groups signed an accord designed to
unify the Balkans by remaking the government's constitutional
structure.
(AP, 11/21/05)(AP, 11/22/05)
2005 Nov 25, EU Enlargement
Commissioner Olli Rehn officially opened landmark negotiations on
closer ties between Bosnia and the 25-member European Union.
(AP, 11/25/05)
2005 Nov 26, Bosnia's southern
town of Mostar unveiled the world's first statue of kung fu legend
Bruce Lee, paying homage to a childhood hero of all its divided
ethnic groups.
(Reuters, 11/28/05)
2005 Dec 7, The Hague war
crimes tribunal sentenced Miroslav Bralo (aka Cicko), a former
Bosnian Croat soldier, to 20 years in jail on eight counts of war
crimes and human rights abuses committed during the 1993
Muslim-Croat war in central Bosnia.
(Reuters, 12/07/05)
2005 Dec 17, In Bosnia the
reconstructed Stari Most, a bridge that came to symbolize the
senseless brutality of the Bosnian war, took its place on the UN's
list of protected World Heritage Sites.
(AP, 12/17/05)
2006 Jan, In the Hague Col.
Vidoje Blagojevic (56), Bosnian Serb wartime commander of the
Bratunac brigade, was convicted of war crimes and complicity in
genocide by the Yugoslav War Crimes Tribunal. In 2007 an appeals
panel overturned the charge of complicity in genocide.
(AP, 5/9/07)
2005 Jun 27, Bosnian Serb
police said they had arrested 11 people on war crimes charges.
(AP, 6/27/05)
2005 Jul 7, In Pale,
Bosnia-Hercegovina, NATO troops arrested Aleksandar Karadzic, the
son of top Bosnian Serb war crimes fugitive Radovan Karadzic, who is
wanted for alleged genocide including the 1995 Srebrenica massacre.
(AFP, 7/7/05)
2005 Jul 19, Miroslav Bralo
(37), former Bosnian Croat special forces soldier, pleaded guilty to
war crimes at the Yugoslav tribunal in the Hague. Bralo was a member
of an infamous unit, known as "the Jokers," responsible for attacks
on Bosnian Muslim villages in the Lasva Valley of central Bosnia and
Herzegovina in 1993.
(AP, 7/19/05)
2005 Aug 8, Milan Lukic, a
former Bosnia Serb paramilitary leader, was captured in Argentina.
He was wanted by a U.N. tribunal on charges of crimes against
humanity.
(AP, 8/8/05)
2005 Sep 13, Sredoje Lukic, a
top Bosnian Serb war crimes suspect, surrendered to the Serb
authorities in Bosnia. He was indicted by a UN tribunal in 2000 for
some of the worst atrocities in the Bosnian war.
(AP, 9/13/05)
2005 Oct 4, A Bosnian Serb
panel said it identified more than 17,000 people with varying levels
of blood on their hands for abetting the 1995 Srebrenica massacre.
(WSJ, 10/5/05, p.A1)
2005 Oct 17, Radovan Karadzic,
former Bosnian-Serb leader and war-crimes fugitive, released a 6th
collection of poems titled “Under the left Breast of the Century.”
(SFC, 10/19/05, p.A2)
2005 Oct 21, The European
Commission agreed to open talks with Bosnia on a cooperation
agreement that could lead to full EU membership for the Balkan
nation.
(AP, 10/21/05)
2005 Oct 27, In Denmark 4 young
Muslims were arrested for helping to supply weapons and explosives
for a planned terror attack in Europe. They helped two main suspects
in Bosnia get hold of weapons and explosives with the aim of
committing a terror act. In 2007 a Danish court convicted Abdul
Basit Abu-Lifa (17) and sentenced him to 7 years in jail.
(AP, 8/24/06)(AP, 2/16/07)
2005 Nov 1, In Bosnia 2
children in Doribaba died when they were playing with a hand grenade
and pulled the security pin.
(AP, 11/2/05)
2005 Nov 21, EU foreign
ministers authorized the start of negotiations on an agreement to
prepare Bosnia for EU membership a decade after the Balkan nation
was ravaged by Europe's worst fighting since World War II. Leaders
of Bosnia's three major ethnic groups signed an accord designed to
unify the Balkans by remaking the government's constitutional
structure.
(AP, 11/21/05)(AP, 11/22/05)
2005 Nov 25, EU Enlargement
Commissioner Olli Rehn officially opened landmark negotiations on
closer ties between Bosnia and the 25-member European Union.
(AP, 11/25/05)
2005 Nov 26, Bosnia's southern
town of Mostar unveiled the world's first statue of kung fu legend
Bruce Lee, paying homage to a childhood hero of all its divided
ethnic groups.
(Reuters, 11/28/05)
2005 Dec 7, The Hague war
crimes tribunal sentenced Miroslav Bralo (aka Cicko), a former
Bosnian Croat soldier, to 20 years in jail on eight counts of war
crimes and human rights abuses committed during the 1993
Muslim-Croat war in central Bosnia.
(Reuters, 12/07/05)
2005 Dec 17, In Bosnia the
reconstructed Stari Most, a bridge that came to symbolize the
senseless brutality of the Bosnian war, took its place on the UN's
list of protected World Heritage Sites.
(AP, 12/17/05)
2006 Jan 5, The wife of
Dragomir Abazovic, a Bosnian Serb war crimes suspect, was killed in
a shoot-out when European Union (EUFOR) peacekeepers moved in to
arrest her husband at their home. Abazovic and the couple's
11-year-old son were also shot and injured.
(AP, 1/5/06)
2006 Jan 31, Dr. Christian
Schwarz-Schilling (b.1930), former German cabinet minister, was
appointed as the EU's High Representative in Bosnia, succeeding Lord
Ashdown.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Schwarz-Schilling)(Econ,
6/30/07, p.60)
2006 Feb 20, Milan Lukic, a
Bosnian Serb war crimes suspect who had been indicted by a UN
tribunal in connection with atrocities during the former war in
Bosnia, was extradited from Argentina to The Hague.
(AP, 2/20/06)
2006 Feb 27, In the Netherlands
the International Court of Justice heard arguments by Bosnia
accusing Serbia of genocide, the first time a state has faced trial
for humanity's worst crime.
(AP, 2/27/06)
2006 Feb 27, Bosnia's
veterinary office said tests at the EU reference laboratory had
confirmed its first case of the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus in two
wild swans.
(AP, 2/27/06)
2006 Mar 22, In the Netherlands
an appeals chamber of the UN war crimes court dropped the life
sentence of Bosnian Serb Milomir Stakic and instead sentenced him to
40 years for overseeing detention camps in Bosnia.
(AFP, 3/22/06)
2006 Apr 18, Christian
Schwarz-Schilling, Bosnia's international administrator, said the
international community should end its decade-long control and allow
Bosnia to assume the responsibilities of a "normal" democracy.
(AP, 4/18/06)
2006 May 8, In the Hague the UN
war crimes court sentenced Ivica Rajic, a Bosnian Croat former
militia leader, to 12 years in prison. Rajic admitted that forces
under his command operating in the Muslim village of Stupni Do in
central Bosnia in October 1993 "forced Bosnian Muslim civilians out
of their homes and hiding places, robbed them of their valuables,
willfully killed Muslim men, women and children and sexually
assaulted Muslim women".
(AFP, 5/8/06)
2006 May 9, Bosnia's war crimes
court launched the trial of 11 Bosnian Serbs charged over the 1995
Srebrenica massacre of 8,000 Bosnian Muslims, its first genocide
trial since it opened last year.
(Reuters, 5/9/06)
2006 May 26, Bosnia's war
crimes court sentenced Bosnian Serb former officer Dragoje Paunovic
to 20 years in prison for crimes against humanity during the
country's 1992-95 war.
(Reuters, 5/26/06)
2006 Jun 9, Bosnia's war crimes
court said it would deliver Serb war crimes suspect Dragan Zelenovic
to the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague after he was handed over
to Sarajevo by Russia. Zelenovic, a former policeman, was wanted by
the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia for
atrocities committed against non-Serbs in the eastern Foca region
during the 1992-95 war. In 2007 Zelenovic was convicted of raping
women in Foca and sentenced to 15 years in prison.
(AP, 6/9/06)(AP, 11/1/07)
2006 Aug 23, Russia’s Gazprom
threatened to cut off gas exports to Bosnia on Oct 1 if strides
toward repaying $104.8 million from debts incurred during wars that
ended in 1995.
(WSJ, 8/24/06, p.A6)
2006 Sep 27, At the Hague,
Netherlands, a UN tribunal sentenced Momcilio Krajisnik (61), the
former speaker of the Bosnian Serb parliament, to 27 years in prison
for war crimes, but acquitted him of the harsher charge of genocide.
(AP, 9/27/06)
2006 Oct 1, Bosnians voted in
historic general elections that will choose the first government to
run the country without international supervision since the end of
the 1992-1995 war.
(AFP, 10/1/06)
2006 Oct 2, Preliminary results
indicated that Bosnians elected new leaders, Milorad Dodik and Haris
Silajdzic, split along ethnic lines over whether to further unify
the country in a push toward European Union membership or allow
Serbs to maintain their political distinctness.
(AP, 10/2/06)(Econ, 6/30/07, p.60)
2006 Nov 21, The UN Security
Council voted to extend the EU peacekeeping force in Bosnia for a
year, welcoming "tangible signs" of the Balkan nation's progress
toward EU membership.
(AP, 11/21/06)
2006 Nov 29, NATO leaders
finished a two-day summit without agreement on some members' refusal
to send troops into combat in Afghanistan's most dangerous regions.
NATO vowed to give its troubled mission in Afghanistan the "forces,
resources and flexibility needed" to tackle increasingly ferocious
Taliban fighters. Leaders invited Serbia, Montenegro and
Bosnia-Herzegovina to join a program considered a first step toward
eventual membership, but urged Serbia and Bosnia to fully cooperate
with the UN war crimes tribunal.
(AP, 11/29/06)(AFP, 11/29/06)
2006 Dec 4, Against a backdrop
of protests, the defense minister gave citations to Dutch troops who
served in the UN peacekeeping force that failed to prevent the
slaughter of Muslims in the Srebrenica enclave during the Bosnian
war.
(AP, 12/4/06)
2007 Jan 10, Bosnia's state
court jailed a Swede, a Turk and a Bosnian for up to 15 years four
months for planning a suicide attack in Europe. All 3 men were
Muslims and wanted to pressure Bosnia and European governments to
withdraw forces from Iraq and Afghanistan.
(Reuters, 1/10/07)
2007 Mar 1, Britain confirmed
it will withdraw its more than 600 remaining troops from Bosnia as
concerns about security in the Balkan state ease.
(AP, 3/1/07)
2007 Apr 22, In Bosnia a
fast-moving fire tore through an orphanage in Sarajevo, killing five
babies and injuring 17 others.
(AP, 4/22/07)
2007 May 19, Miroslav Deronjic
(52), Bosnian Serb war criminal, died in a hospital in Sweden.
Deronjic, the top authority in the eastern Bosnian city of Bratunac
during the 1992-1995 Bosnian War, was convicted of ordering a 1992
attack on a Bosnian village in which 65 civilians were killed. He
had been serving a 10-year sentence for war crimes.
(AP, 5/20/07)
2007 May 25, Radovan Stankovic,
a convicted Bosnian Serb war criminal, escaped from custody while
being transported to a hospital in eastern Bosnia after complaining
of feeling ill.
(AP, 5/25/07)
2007 Jun 4, Thousands of
survivors of Europe's worst massacre since World War II filed a
lawsuit against the UN and the Dutch government for their failure to
protect civilians in the Srebrenica safe haven when Bosnian Serb
forces overran it in 1995 and slaughtered some 8,000 men.
(AP, 6/4/07)
2007 Jun 9, In Bosnia Karray
Kamel bin Ali, alias Abu Hamza, Tunisian-born radical Islamist, was
arrested near Zenica. This was several hours after he and possibly
three or four others attacked a house owned by Zijad Kovac. 3 family
members were wounded.
(http://isaintel.com/site/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=45)
2007 Jun 11, In Bosnia
thousands of survivors of Europe's worst massacre since WW II
protested in Sarajevo, demanding a special administrative status for
the town of Srebrenica and saying it should not be run by Bosnian
Serb authorities who were responsible for genocide there.
(AP, 6/11/07)
2007 Jul 1, Miroslav Lajcak,
Slovak diplomat, took over as the EU's High Representative in Bosnia
replacing Dr. Christian Schwarz-Schilling.
(Econ, 6/30/07, p.60)
2007 Jul 18, Bosnia's war
crimes court acquitted Momcilo Mandic, the most senior ethnic Serb
official indicted by Bosnian authorities, of all charges related to
crimes during the 1992-95 war.
(Reuters, 7/18/07)
2007 Sep 30, Milan Jelic (51),
president of Bosnia's Serb Republic died of a heart attack after
less than a year on the job.
(AP, 10/1/07)
2007 Nov 1, Bosnian PM Nikola
Spiric resigned in protest at an international envoy's decision to
impose EU-backed reforms, deepening the country's worst post-war
political crisis.
(AFP, 11/1/07)
2007 Oct 1, The Bosnian Serb
parliament approved Igor Radojcic, the government's candidate, as
interim president following the death of President Milan Jelic.
(AP, 10/1/07)
2007 Nov 21, The UN Security
Council extended the EU's peacekeeping force in Bosnia for a year,
citing the Balkan nation's "very limited progress" towards EU
membership and its failure to implement key reforms.
(AP, 11/22/07)
2007 Dec 5, In Bosnia 4 men
wearing police uniforms and armed with automatic weapons stormed
Sarajevo international airport's cargo zone and stole $1.9 million.
(AP, 12/6/07)
2007 Dec 9, Voters in Bosnia's
Serb entity went to polls to choose a new president, as the country
was taking initial steps towards European integration.
(AFP, 12/9/07)
2007 Dec 12, The UN Yugoslav
war crimes tribunal at The Hague sentenced former Bosnian Serb
general Dragomir Milosevic (b.1942) to 33 years imprisonment for the
shelling of Sarajevo during the Bosnian war, one of the court's
toughest sentences. In 2009 UN judges trimmed the sentence from 33
to 29 years but upheld his convictions for leading troops who
terrorized Sarajevo with a deadly rain of shells and sniper bullets.
(AP, 12/12/07)(AP, 11/12/09)
2008 Mar 4, The US embassy in
Sarajevo said the US government has cut development aid to the
political party of Bosnian Serb PM Milorad Dodik because of its
nationalist policy.
(AP, 3/4/08)
2008 Mar 25, Director Koichiro
Matsuura said that Visegrad’s Mehmed Pasha Sokolovic bridge, a 16th
century stone bridge over the Drina River that links Bosnia and
Serbia, has been added to UNESCO's World Heritage List. A ceremony
in Sarajevo marked the event.
(AP, 3/26/08)
2008 May 29, Tomislav Petrovic,
a former Bosnian soldier, shot dead six people and wounded another
in a rampage in a Tuzla before being detained as he fired on a
parked car.
(AFP, 5/29/08)
2008 Jun 4, In Bosnia genocide
charges were filed against Vaso Todorovic (40), a former Bosnian
Serb police officer. He was accused of taking part in the 1995
massacre of more than 7,000 Muslims, Europe's worst slaughter since
World War II.
(www.signonsandiego.com/news/world/20080604-0441-bosnia-warcrimes.html)
2008 Jun 16, Bosnia signed a
stabilization agreement with the EU, the first step towards
membership.
(Econ, 6/21/08, p.64)
2008 Jun 19, In central Bosnia
a helicopter carrying two Spanish pilots of the EU peace force and
two German officers crashed, but it was not clear if there were any
casualties.
(AP, 6/19/08)
2008 Jun 21, Serb authorities
turned over an ex-Bosnian Serb police chief to the Yugoslav war
crimes tribunal in the Netherlands. Stojan Zupljanin was arrested in
the town of Pancevo last week after nine years on the run.
(AP, 6/21/08)
2008 Jul 21, Radovan Karadzic
(63), the wartime leader of Bosnian Serbs, was arrested in a
Belgrade suburb. A judge ordered his transfer to the UN war crimes
tribunal in The Hague.
(AP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 29, The Bosnian war
crimes court convicted seven Bosnian Serbs of genocide in the 1995
massacre of Bosnian Muslims at Srebrenica and handed down prison
sentences ranging from 38 to 42 years. Four others were acquitted.
Milenko Trifunovic, Brano Dzinic and Aleksandar Radovanovic received
the 42-year sentences, while Milos Stupar, Slobodan Jakovljevic and
Branislav Medan each got 40 years and Petar Mitrovic received 38
years.
(AP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 30, Former Bosnian
Serb leader Radovan Karadzic sat in a UN jail cell after being flown
to the Netherlands in the dead of night to face charges of genocide
against Muslims and Croats during the Balkan wars of the 1990s.
(AP, 7/30/08)
2008 Sep 10, A Dutch court
dismissed a bid by Bosnian Muslim survivors of the 1995 Srebrenica
massacre to hold the Netherlands liable for its troops' failure to
protect the so-called safe haven.
(AP, 9/10/08)
2008 Oct 14, The prosecution
office of Bosnia's war crimes court said it ordered the arrest of
Milorad Skrbic, 48; Milorad Radakovic, 46; Gordan Djuric, 40; and
Ljubisa Cetic, 39, for allegedly having participated in 1992 in the
wartime execution of 200 civilians.
(AP, 10/14/08)
2008 Nov 20, The UN Security
Council voted unanimously to extend the European Union's
peacekeeping force in Bosnia for a year, emphasizing the importance
of the country's progress towards Euro-Atlantic integration.
(AP, 11/20/08)
2008 Dec 16, Three Guantanamo
prisoners were flown to Bosnia and released to their families.
(SFC, 12/17/08, p.A2)
2008 Carla Del Ponte, a Swiss
prosecutor, authored (with Chuck Sudetic) “Madame Prosecutor:
Confrontations with Humanity’s Worst Criminals and the Culture of
Impunity.” It covered her 8 years chasing Balkan war criminals. In
2009 this Italian edition was made available in English.
(Econ, 1/24/09, p.88)
2008 Gen. Rasim Delic (d.2010
at 61), wartime commander of the Bosnian Army, was convicted of
cruelty to Bosnian Serb prisoners during Bosnia's 1992-95 war. Delic
was the most senior Muslim Bosniak officer convicted by the court in
its 17-year history.
(AP, 4/16/10)
2009 Mar 17, In the Netherlands
the UN criminal tribunal for the former Yugoslavia reduced the jail
sentence of Bosnian Serb leader Momcilo Krajisnik from 27 to 20
years, quashing some convictions from a 2006 judgment.
(AP, 3/17/09)
2009 Jun 5, Bosnia’s war crimes
court Zeljko Ivankovic (37), a former member of a Bosnian Serb
special police unit, had taken part in the July 11, 1995, killing of
at least 1,000 Muslim men from Srebrenica and that he would be tried
for genocide.
(SFC, 6/6/09,
p.A2)(www.emportal.rs/en/news/region/81408.html)
2009 Jun 19, Valentin Inzko,
the int’l. community’s envoy in Bosnia, moved to invoke
extraordinary legal powers after Bosnian Serb leaders passed
legislation that he said undermined the 1995 Dayton peace accords.
(SFC, 6/20/09, p.A3)
2009 Jul 20, A UN war crimes
court in the Hague convicted Milan Lukic and Sredoje Lukic, two
Bosnian Serb cousins, for a "callous" 1992 killing spree that
included locking scores of Muslims in two houses and burning them
alive in Visegrad. He sentenced Milan to life in prison and Sredoje
to 30 years.
(AP, 7/20/09)
2009 Sep 15, In the Netherlands
the Yugoslav war crimes tribunal announced it has approved the early
release from prison of former Bosnian Serb President Biljana Plavsic
(79) after she served two-thirds of her 11-year sentence for
persecution.
(AP, 9/15/09)
2009 Oct 16, Bosnia's war
crimes court jailed Milorad Trbic (51), a former Serb army captain,
for 30 years for killing dozens and taking part in the persecution
and detention of thousands during the July, 1995, Srebrenica
massacre of some 8,000 Muslims. The court acquitted Trbic of
genocide charges due to lack of evidence.
(Reuters, 10/16/09)
2009 Oct 22, The Swedish
government approved the early release of former Bosnian Serb
President Biljana Plavsic (79), who was sentenced to 11 years in
prison by a war crimes tribunal. The Justice Ministry says she will
be released on Oct 27 after serving two-thirds of her sentence for
persecution.
(AP, 10/22/09)
2009 Oct 27, At The Hague
Radovan Karadzic boycotted his UN trial for a second day while
prosecutors began outlining their genocide case against the former
Bosnian Serb leader.
(AP, 10/27/09)
2009 Oct 30, The prime minister
of Bosnia's Serb half said he would pull out of talks on
constitutional reform led by the United States and European Union
set to speed up Bosnia's path to EU and NATO membership.
(Reuters, 10/30/09)
2009 Nov 5, In the Netherlands
the UN war crimes tribunal decided that former Bosnian Serb leader
Radovan Karadzic will be appointed a lawyer to represent him
whenever he fails to appear in court.
(AP, 11/5/09)
2009 Dec 13, In Serbia a grimy
three-car train pulled out of Belgrade's railway station on the
first direct trip to Sarajevo in nearly 18 years, restoring a link
broken at the start of ethnic warfare in the former Yugoslavia.
(AP, 12/13/09)
2009 Dec 22, The EU Court of
Human Rights said Bosnia’s constitution discriminates against Jews
and Roma because it does not allow them to run for parliament of
president. Only Bosnians, Serbs and Croats are allowed to run for
those offices.
(SFC, 12/23/09, p.A2)
2010 Jan 20, The United States
extradited to Bosnia Nedjo Ikonic (45), a former Serb policeman. He
was suspected of taking part in genocide against Muslims in
Srebrenica in 1995, Europe's worst massacre since WWII.
(Reuters, 1/20/10)
2010 Feb 2, A remote Bosnian
village, home to highly conservative Wahhabi Muslims, was raided by
hundreds of police who said they were searching for an unspecified
security threat.
(AP, 2/2/10)
2010 Mar 3, A British judge
ordered former Bosnian Vice President Ejup Ganic held in custody
despite a request to release him while he challenges a Serbian
demand that he be extradited for alleged war crimes. Ganic was
arrested March 1 at Heathrow Airport after Serbia issued an arrest
warrant accusing him of war crimes in connection with the 1992
deaths of Serbian troops in Bosnia.
(AP, 3/3/10)
2010 Mar 30, Serbia's
parliament approved a declaration condemning the 1995 Serb massacre
of 8,000 Muslims in Srebrenica, in a bid to distance the country
from past warmongering under the late strongman Slobodan Milosevic.
(AP, 3/30/10)
2010 Apr 21, In Bosnia war
veterans protested proposed cuts in state benefits and set fire to a
regional government building before being dispersed by riot police.
(SFC, 4/22/10, p.A2)
2010 Jun 9, The Bosnian war
crimes court indicted three members of a Bosnian Serb paramilitary
group over killings, torture and detention of Muslims in eastern
Bosnia early in the 1992-95 war. Milan Kornjaca (56) Milorad
Zivkovic 54) and Dusko Tadic (46) were charged with taking part in a
widespread and systematic attack on Muslim civilians in the town of
Cajnice from mid-April to end-May 1992.
(Reuters, 6/9/10)
2010 Jun 10, Two Bosnian Serbs,
Vujadin Popovic and Ljubisa Beara, were convicted of genocide and
sentenced to life imprisonment for the 1995 massacre of some 8,000
Muslims in Srebrenica, the harshest judgment ever delivered by the
UN war crimes tribunal on the Balkan wars. It was a dramatic
conclusion to the largest trial conducted by the tribunal.
(AP, 6/10/10)
2010 Jun 23, In Bosnia
firefighters and volunteers worked overnight and into the day to
evacuate dozens of towns and villages due to flooding.
(AP, 6/23/10)
2010 Jun 27, In Bosnia an
explosion at a police station left one officer dead and five
injured. 2 suspects were soon arrested in connection with the
explosion. The primary suspect appeared to be an Islamic
fundamentalist, fanatic rock fan and Che Guevara admirer.
(AP, 6/28/10)
2010 Jul 9, Prosecutors at the
Yugoslav war crimes tribunal in The Hague cited Ratko Mladic's
diaries, seized in a raid on his wife's Belgrade home in February,
in a motion to reopen the trial of former Bosnian Croat political
leader Jadranko Prlic and five other political and military Croat
officials that ended two months ago.
(AP, 7/9/10)
2010 Jul 28, Former Bosnian
Vice President Ejup Ganic returned to Sarajevo and was greeted by
hundreds of supporters a day after a British judge declared him a
free man and rejected Serbia's request for his extradition to face
war crimes charges.
(AP, 7/28/10)
2010 Aug 11, Bosnian officials
said they have so far found 60 partial skeletons in the muddy banks
of the manmade Lake Perucac in eastern Bosnia since the water level
was lowered for dam maintenance. The victims were killed at the
beginning of the 1992-95 war, thrown into the Drina river, and
lodged into the banks of the lake.
(AP, 8/11/10)
2010 Aug 13, The Bosnia's war
crimes court confirmed charges of genocide for 4 former Bosnian Serb
army soldiers over the killing of at least 800 Bosnian Muslims from
Srebrenica in July, 1995. Franc Kos, Stanko Kojic, Vlastimir Golijan
and Zoran Goronja all served with the Bosnian Serb army's 10th
commando unit.
(Reuters, 8/13/10)(AP, 8/13/10)
2010 Aug 27, Forensic experts
in Bosnia said they have exhumed the remains of 54 Muslim civilians
killed in the July, 1995, Srebrenica massacre. The skeletal remains
were dug out of three mass graves buried under garbage at a dump
site near Srebrenica.
(AP, 8/27/10)
2010 Oct 3, Voters in
Bosnia-Herzegovina cast ballots in elections likely to further
entrench their nation's ethnic divisions and threaten possible EU
entry. Some 3 million voters uneasily split between Serbs, Bosniaks
and Croats chose from 8,000 candidates for the central and several
regional parliaments, the Bosnian Serb presidency and the federal
presidency. Preliminary election results indicated that the
three-person presidency will remain deadlocked over the nation's
future, with two leaders of the ethnically divided country
advocating unity and a third pushing for the country's breakup.
(AP, 10/3/10)
2010 Oct 26, Authorities in
Bosnia and Serbia said they had recovered the skeletal remains of at
least 97 people from the banks of a border lake that was partially
drained this summer for maintenance. Most were killed by Serbs in
the nearby town of Visegrad at the start of the 1992-1995 Bosnian
War. But on the Serbian side experts found the remains of what they
presume to be 11 Albanians killed during the Kosovo war in
1998-1999.
(AP, 10/26/10)
2010 Nov 10, Bosnia inaugurated
its new three-member presidency, and the leaders of the Bosniak,
Serb and Croat communities remained deadlocked over key issues
regarding the nation's future.
(AP, 11/10/10)
2010 Dec 2, Heavy snow caused
travel chaos across much of northern Europe, keeping London's
Gatwick airport closed for a second day and disrupting road and rail
travel in France, Germany and Switzerland. Freezing temperatures and
often blinding snowfall killed 12 people, 10 in Poland and 2 in
Germany. Poland had already reported 8 dead due to the cold. Some of
the worst floods in a century devastated parts of the Balkans.
Authorities declared a state of emergency in Bosnia, Serbia and
Montenegro.
(Reuters, 12/2/10)(AP, 12/2/10)
2010 Dec 3, Authorities in
Bosnia, Serbia and Montenegro declared a state of emergency and
evacuated hundreds of people after heavy rainfall caused severe
flooding along the Drina River, the worst in 104 years.
(AP, 12/3/10)
2010 Bosnia’s population
numbered about 3.8 million.
(Econ, 10/2/10, p.54)
2011 Jan 18, Israeli police
arrested Aleksander Cvetkovic, a former Bosnian Serb soldier. He was
suspected by Bosnian authorities to be a member of an eight-man
firing squad involved in executing between 1,000 and 1,200 Bosnian
Muslims at the Branjevo Farm in July 1995.
(AP, 1/18/11)
2011 Mar 3, Austria detained
Serbian colonel Jovan Divjak (73) on a Serbian warrant. He had
defected to Bosnia's army at the start of the conflict between the
two sides. Divjak awaited a hearing on whether he should be
extradited on suspicion of war crimes.
(AP, 3/4/11)
2011 Mar 21, Bosnian police
said they have seized some 2 million child pornography pictures and
7,000 video clips in the arrest of an alleged member of an
international online child pornography ring. An unidentified
46-year-old suspect was arrested over the weekend following a raid
on his home in the northern town of Derventa.
(AP, 3/21/11)
2011 Apr 13, Edin Dzeko (39) of
Washington state was arrested for extraction to Bosnia for his
alleged participation in the massacre of Croatian civilians in the
village of Trusina as a member of a Bosnian army unit in April,
1993. 16 civilians and at least 4 disarmed soldiers were killed in
the village.
(SFC, 4/14/11, p.A5)
2011 May 26, Bosnian Serb
wartime general Ratko Mladic (69) was arrested in Serbia after years
on the run from international genocide charges, opening the way for
the once-pariah state to seek membership in the European Union.
(Reuters, 5/26/11)
2011 Jun, The FBI and
Interpol conducted "Operation Hive," which resulted in the arrests
of two Metulji operators in Bosnia and Slovenia. The world's biggest
criminal botnet, that has enslaved tens of millions of computers
across 172 countries, was named “Metulji," Slovenian for
"butterfly."
(http://tinyurl.com/4346r4y)
2011 Jul 5, An appeals judges
ruled that the Netherlands was responsible for the deaths of three
Bosnian Muslim men slain by Serbs during the 1995 Srebrenica
massacre, ordering the Dutch government to compensate the men's
relatives.
(AP, 7/5/11)
2011 Sep 6, At the Hague,
Netherlands, the Yugoslav war crimes tribunal sentenced Gen. Momcilo
Perisic, the former chief of the Yugoslav army, to 27 years
imprisonment for providing crucial military aid to Bosnian Serb
forces responsible for the 1995 Srebrenica massacre and for a deadly
four-year campaign of shelling and sniping in Sarajevo.
(AP, 9/6/11)
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End of file