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- <text id=93TT2221>
- <title>
- Sep. 13, 1993: Under Siege
- </title>
- <history>
- TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1993
- Sep. 13, 1993 Leap Of Faith
- </history>
- <article>
- <source>Time Magazine</source>
- <hdr>
- BOSNIA, Page 52
- Under Siege
- </hdr>
- <body>
- <p>Battered and bloodied, a historic city clings to the hope of
- survival
- </p>
- <p> No bridge of sighs has seen more to lament than the Stari Most
- spanning the Neretva River in historic Mostar. Last week, as
- a precarious cease-fire held in central Bosnia, the bridge,
- festooned with old automobile tires in a gallant attempt to
- protect it from the ravages of shell and mortar fire, stood
- in testimony to the most fervent hope of the trapped citizens
- of this shattered town--that somehow the yawning gap between
- war and peace can be bridged and life allowed to resume again.
- </p>
- <p> With the peace talks in Geneva flickering on the brink of collapse,
- however, such hopes appear forlorn, and for the moment the beleaguered
- citizens of Mostar's mainly Muslim eastern quarter are surviving
- day to day on whatever aid can be negotiated past the city's
- Croat besiegers. Last week Muslim civilians released U.N. troops
- they had held for more than a week as a shield against Croat
- shelling, making a resumption of aid possible. But unless peace
- comes soon, U.N. aid can only postpone the death of one of Bosnia
- and Herzegovina's most beautiful and historic cities.
- </p>
- <p> In the western section of Mostar, the Croats clean their weapons
- and wait. More than 10,000 Muslims are reportedly being held
- in a detention center near the city and in four other towns
- to the south. Breaking with a long-standing policy of diplomatic
- silence, the International Committee of the Red Cross has reported
- severe malnutrition among camp inmates; Muslims have filled
- out the details with reports of brutal beatings and even torture.
- The perdition visible in these pictures only begins to reflect
- the impossibility of putting the heritage of peaceful coexistence
- back together again in Mostar--a difficulty reflected sadly
- throughout the rest of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
- </p>
-
- </body>
- </article>
- </text>
-
-