Mostar, Bosnia & Herzegovina

It is difficult to write about Bosnia & Herzegovina without recapping its role in the 1990s Yugoslav Wars and how it got where it is today. The former Yugoslavia was a federation of six republics that brought together Serbs, Croats, Bosnian Muslims, Albanians, Slovenes and others under a comparatively relaxed communist regime. Any quarrels between these groups were simply suppressed under the leadership of President Tito.

After Tito’s death in 1980, tensions re-emerged. Calls for more autonomy within Yugoslavia by nationalist groups led in 1991 to declarations of independence in Croatia and Slovenia. The Serb-dominated Yugoslav army lashed out, first in Slovenia and then in Croatia. Thousands were killed in the latter conflict which was paused in 1992 under a UN-monitored ceasefire.

Bosnia, with a complex mix of Serbs, Muslims and Croats, was next to try for independence. Bosnia’s Serbs, backed by Serbs elsewhere in Yugoslavia, resisted. Under leader Radovan Karadzic, they threatened bloodshed if Bosnia’s Muslims and Croats – who outnumbered Serbs – broke away. War followed quickly.

Yugoslav army units, withdrawn from Croatia and renamed the Bosnian Serb Army, carved out a huge swathe of Serb-dominated territory. Over a million Bosnian Muslims and Croats were driven from their homes in ethnic cleansing. Serbs suffered too. The capital Sarajevo was besieged and its Holiday Inn achieved the unenviable distinction of being the most bombed hotel in Europe (surpassing the IRA-troubled Europa Hotel in Belfast, which had held the title for decades.) Ultimately, more than 100,000 died despite the efforts of UN peacekeepers to quell the fighting.

The Bosnian War ended in 1995 after NATO bombed the Bosnian Serbs, and Muslim and Croat armies made gains on the ground. A US-brokered peace (the Dayton Accords) divided Bosnia into two self-governing entities, a Bosnian Serb republic and a Muslim-Croat federation lightly bound by a central government. Other components of the Yugoslav Wars continued for years, including the conflicts of 1998-99 in Kosovo.

Today, Bosnia & Herzegovina has sort of moved on and has recently been accepted as a candidate for membership of the European Union, but reminders of the war are palpable here.

A building heavily pockmarked from shelling during the civil war.

We set out from Ploče on the Croatian Adriatic coast to drive into Bosnia & Herzegovina. We wanted to visit Mostar and particularly its old bridge, which is a highlight of the region. Heading towards Sarajevo, the capital, the drive takes about an hour, unless you get held up at the Croatia-Bosnia border. This will happen if you’re on a tour bus while officials moving at a glacial pace inspect everyone’s passport, but car passengers can expect faster treatment.

The scenery along the drive varies from fairly barren to dramatic landscapes, with quite a lot of modern infrastructure, but the approach to the city is unremarkable. The old town around the bridge is pedestrian-only but Mostar and the Stari Most, to give the old bridge its proper name, suddenly appear in all their glory after a reasonably short walk from the parking lot.

Mostar is a delight with cobblestoned streets – some of them treacherously slippery, particularly over the bridge – old stone buildings and of course its eye-catching bridge spanning the picturesque Neretva River. Mostar is a city, although it feels like a town, but it is in fact the cultural centre and the largest city of the Herzegovina region.

Mostar is named after the bridge keepers on the Neretva River, the mostari. It began as a small town on a trading route between the Adriatic Coast – roughly where we left from – and central Bosnia. In 1468 the region came under Ottoman control.

In 1566, under orders from the dubiously named Suleiman the Magnificent, the tenth sultan of the Ottoman Empire, the existing wooden bridge was rebuilt in stone and stood there in that form for 427 years. The stone bridge was a masterpiece when it was built, and it is said to be one of the most important structures built during the Ottoman era and an engineering marvel of its age.

In November 1993 during the Yugoslav Wars, the bridge was destroyed in a Croatian artillery attack. After the war, Stari Most was painstakingly reconstructed using 16th-century building techniques and stone sourced from the original quarry. It reopened in 2004 and was declared a UNESCO World Heritage site a year later.

Stari Most is famous for its bridge divers, at which you can gaze from numerous well-positioned cafes and restaurants located on both sides of the river. However, they don’t dive very often and it’s hardly surprising as the Neretva River is cold and uninviting. Those who do can often be seen on the bridge waiting for the right moment (or for enough money to be collected from passing tourists!)

We watched one such specimen, a muscular young man with the confident swagger of the alpha male, surrounded by a bevy of female admirers. While we watched he showed no sign that diving was imminent and perhaps it had occurred to him, as it did to me, that what he was doing was far more pleasant and comfortable than jumping off the bridge.

There are myriad souvenir shops and clothing stores on both sides of the river and happily they are arranged in such a way that they don’t detract from the prettiness of the town. However, poignant reminders of the war are everywhere in the form of damaged and abandoned buildings.

Other noteworthy attractions include the smaller Crooked Bridge or Kriva Cuprija, the Mostar Peace Bell Tower which can be seen from everywhere in the city and is often used as a meeting place; and the Koski Mehmed Pasha Mosque, another exquisite piece of Ottoman architecture. These can all be seen in the three pictures immediately above.

We finished the day at a pleasant outdoor restaurant with a meal of peka, a delicious lamb roast slow-cooked over an open fire, washed down with a carafe of house wine.

Photos © Judy Barford

Civil war history source: BBC News