On this day in 1992, the Siege of Sarajevo began.
The longest siege of a capital city in the history of modern warfare.
It lasted 3 years, 10 months, 3 weeks & 3 days (5 Apr 1992 to 29 Feb 1996)
When I first got there in 1995, power and water was strictly rationed, everything was damaged snipers shot at you and Chetniks lobbed mortars indiscriminately. There were no windows.
11,541 civilians were slaughtered during the seige 1,601 of whom were children.
Bosnian resilience was incredible though. They tunnelled under the UN controlled airport and manged to establish an aid route into the city.
This allowed agencies like Edinburgh Direct Aid to take aid over Mt Igman to the entrance and the aid to be taken through the tunnel.
It was a dangerous drive though and We were shot at by anti aircraft guns, and mortared.
In April 95 we were lucky to only lose a truck. This photo shows the Smouldering wreck of one of our convoy trucks
One of the most extraordinary experiences was returning to the tunnel on 2014- it's now a museum- and walking the same route our boxes took
But we were lucky. We got to go home after delivering the aid. But for the people of Saravejo, that wasn't an option instead they endured the snipers, the shelling (300 shells a day) not to forget the bitter Bosnian winters
But I also want to remember Scottish Aid Worker Neil Golightly
Neil died on Igman, on that same hellish road trying to bring help to others. If only he knew how much that meant to the beseiged Bosnians below. heraldscotland.com/news/12091587.…
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