The Washington Post
February 25, 1993
SARAJEVO – A broken clock in Senadin Seta’s kitchen shows the time of 4:50. That’s when a Serb tank shell smashed through the ceiling Tuesday.
Senadin, 32, was in the courtyard. It was the first day of Ramadan, the holy month when Muslims fast through the day. His wife was upstairs in the kitchen, where she had cooked special muffins for the traditional evening meal. Their 2-year-old daughter was asleep on a couch.
Senadin heard the whistle of the shell and the terrifying whump when it hit the roof. He tore indoors, ran up the curving wood stairs, past a picture of kittens, and burst into the kitchen where his life lay in ruins, shattered like the ceiling. The room was filled with dust kicked up by the blast.
“My wife was screaming. She cried that our daughter had been hurt,” he recalled wearily today, less than 24 hours after the event. “I grabbed my child in my arms and ran through the snow to the hospital without my shoes on. But it was too late. A small piece of shrapnel had hit her heart.”
The scene at the hospital was recorded by a television cameraman. Senadin was sitting on a chair, crying — a sleeve of his white sweater coated with his daughter’s blood. Her name was Almedena, and she had curly brown hair. There was a blotch of blood on his chest, where he had cradled the dying child as he ran to the hospital. His fingers were smeared with her blood too.
Senadin’s wife was lying on a stretcher. She had been wounded in the leg by shrapnel. She knew what had happened, that her only child was dead. There was a long moan, and then the cry with which many Sarajevo mothers have pierced the cold air: “Why didn’t God take me instead of my child?”
This happens almost daily in Sarajevo. A Muslim family, a Serb bomb, and a blood-stained tragedy. Perhaps a baby is killed, or perhaps a housewife, or perhaps a baby and a housewife and a husband too. Almost every imaginable permutation of communal death has happened in Sarajevo over the past 10 months and continues to happen.
Last spring, there was the bread-line massacre. A shell landed smack in the middle of dozens of pensioners, housewives and children who were lining up for bread. At least 18 of them died.
Last month, Sarajevo had a water-line massacre. It was much the same: pensioners, housewives and children lining up to get water. Eight of them were snuffed out by the explosion. Death is the potential cost of a loaf of bread or gallon of water.
According to the Serbs, it is not their fault. They say they did not fire those shells that have killed thousands of Sarajevo residents — the Muslims did. Muslims, Serbs say, are willing to kill their own people and blame it on the Serbs to bring about international military intervention. It is the same for the shelled buildings: The Muslims, Serbs say, want to destroy their offices and homes and blame it on the Serbs.
U.N. commanders in Bosnia have said both sides, on occasion, have shelled their own people, in order, one said, “to create a particular image.” But there is no doubt here that the majority of shelling of civilians in Sarajevo has been done by Serbs.
There are no vacancies in the Sarajevo cemetery now. All the plots have been filled. The trees are gone, too, cut down to heat the living so that they do not become the dead. A soccer field is being used as a cemetery, and it still has vacancies — but probably not for long.
“I know there are people around the world who are supporting our struggle,” said Senadin, who makes jewelry in the courtyard workshop, along with his father and brother. “But the politicians only pass resolutions and don’t apply them. They are just pretending to do something.”
Like the clock, time has stood still at the Setas’ house. The two plates of muffins are on the table, layered now in a coat of dust from the dislodged plaster. Somebody’s slippers are next to the couch, covered in that same bluish dirt.
There’s a foot-deep pile of rubble under the new hole in the ceiling, and today bright sunlight shone through it. Snow from the roof is melting and dripping onto the kitchen floor. Almedena’s tiny parka, with string-connected gloves dangling from its sleeves, hangs in a corner.
Outside, her white undershirts are still hanging on the laundry line. They are dry now. No one has taken them down. Perhaps the reality of her death hasn’t sunk in, or perhaps no one wants to touch them. This is Sarajevo.
Before the shell landed, the Setas’ living room was a picture of tranquility. According to Nazif Seta, the dead girl’s grandfather, Almedena had been playing with her dolls and her mother was putting her to sleep before the adults gathered for their evening meal. Nazif was at the other end of the couch when the shell hit.
“They are criminals,” he said of the Serb forces that have made a misery of his life, and many others’. He tightened his thick workman’s hands into a fist. “I would never try to harm a Serb woman or child, but if I could find the man who did this, I would kill him.”
The Seta family lives less than a hundred yards from Sarajevo’s Hadzijska mosque, which may have been the target of the shell. At least two others hit the mosque. The Serbs’ point, on the first day of Ramadan, may have been to tell the Muslims their religion is not welcome in Bosnia. Bombs landed near several other mosques at about the same time.
It was 4:50 p.m.
The Washington Post
February 25, 1993
SARAJEVO – A broken clock in Senadin Seta’s kitchen shows the time of 4:50. That’s when a Serb tank shell smashed through the ceiling Tuesday.
Senadin, 32, was in the courtyard. It was the first day of Ramadan, the holy month when Muslims fast through the day. His wife was upstairs in the kitchen, where she had cooked special muffins for the traditional evening meal. Their 2-year-old daughter was asleep on a couch.
Senadin heard the whistle of the shell and the terrifying whump when it hit the roof. He tore indoors, ran up the curving wood stairs, past a picture of kittens, and burst into the kitchen where his life lay in ruins, shattered like the ceiling. The room was filled with dust kicked up by the blast.
“My wife was screaming. She cried that our daughter had been hurt,” he recalled wearily today, less than 24 hours after the event. “I grabbed my child in my arms and ran through the snow to the hospital without my shoes on. But it was too late. A small piece of shrapnel had hit her heart.”
The scene at the hospital was recorded by a television cameraman. Senadin was sitting on a chair, crying — a sleeve of his white sweater coated with his daughter’s blood. Her name was Almedena, and she had curly brown hair. There was a blotch of blood on his chest, where he had cradled the dying child as he ran to the hospital. His fingers were smeared with her blood too.
Senadin’s wife was lying on a stretcher. She had been wounded in the leg by shrapnel. She knew what had happened, that her only child was dead. There was a long moan, and then the cry with which many Sarajevo mothers have pierced the cold air: “Why didn’t God take me instead of my child?”
This happens almost daily in Sarajevo. A Muslim family, a Serb bomb, and a blood-stained tragedy. Perhaps a baby is killed, or perhaps a housewife, or perhaps a baby and a housewife and a husband too. Almost every imaginable permutation of communal death has happened in Sarajevo over the past 10 months and continues to happen.
Last spring, there was the bread-line massacre. A shell landed smack in the middle of dozens of pensioners, housewives and children who were lining up for bread. At least 18 of them died.
Last month, Sarajevo had a water-line massacre. It was much the same: pensioners, housewives and children lining up to get water. Eight of them were snuffed out by the explosion. Death is the potential cost of a loaf of bread or gallon of water.
According to the Serbs, it is not their fault. They say they did not fire those shells that have killed thousands of Sarajevo residents — the Muslims did. Muslims, Serbs say, are willing to kill their own people and blame it on the Serbs to bring about international military intervention. It is the same for the shelled buildings: The Muslims, Serbs say, want to destroy their offices and homes and blame it on the Serbs.
U.N. commanders in Bosnia have said both sides, on occasion, have shelled their own people, in order, one said, “to create a particular image.” But there is no doubt here that the majority of shelling of civilians in Sarajevo has been done by Serbs.
There are no vacancies in the Sarajevo cemetery now. All the plots have been filled. The trees are gone, too, cut down to heat the living so that they do not become the dead. A soccer field is being used as a cemetery, and it still has vacancies — but probably not for long.
“I know there are people around the world who are supporting our struggle,” said Senadin, who makes jewelry in the courtyard workshop, along with his father and brother. “But the politicians only pass resolutions and don’t apply them. They are just pretending to do something.”
Like the clock, time has stood still at the Setas’ house. The two plates of muffins are on the table, layered now in a coat of dust from the dislodged plaster. Somebody’s slippers are next to the couch, covered in that same bluish dirt.
There’s a foot-deep pile of rubble under the new hole in the ceiling, and today bright sunlight shone through it. Snow from the roof is melting and dripping onto the kitchen floor. Almedena’s tiny parka, with string-connected gloves dangling from its sleeves, hangs in a corner.
Outside, her white undershirts are still hanging on the laundry line. They are dry now. No one has taken them down. Perhaps the reality of her death hasn’t sunk in, or perhaps no one wants to touch them. This is Sarajevo.
Before the shell landed, the Setas’ living room was a picture of tranquility. According to Nazif Seta, the dead girl’s grandfather, Almedena had been playing with her dolls and her mother was putting her to sleep before the adults gathered for their evening meal. Nazif was at the other end of the couch when the shell hit.
“They are criminals,” he said of the Serb forces that have made a misery of his life, and many others’. He tightened his thick workman’s hands into a fist. “I would never try to harm a Serb woman or child, but if I could find the man who did this, I would kill him.”
The Seta family lives less than a hundred yards from Sarajevo’s Hadzijska mosque, which may have been the target of the shell. At least two others hit the mosque. The Serbs’ point, on the first day of Ramadan, may have been to tell the Muslims their religion is not welcome in Bosnia. Bombs landed near several other mosques at about the same time.
It was 4:50 p.m.
Author: Peter Maass
I was born and raised in Los Angeles. In 1983, after graduating from the University of California at Berkeley, I went to Brussels as a copy editor for The Wall Street Journal/Europe. I left the Journal in 1985 to write for The New York Times and The International Herald Tribune, covering NATO and the European Union. In 1987 I moved to Seoul, South Korea, where I wrote primarily for The Washington Post. After three years in Asia I moved to Budapest to cover Eastern Europe and the Balkans. I spent most of 1992 and 1993 covering the war in Bosnia for the Post.
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