Jul 24th, 2008 · Radovan Karadzic's arrest on war crimes charges was met with a burst of celebration in the streets of Sarajevo, which suffered a brutal siege during the Bosnia war in the 1990s at the hands of Bosnia Serb militias loyal to Karadzic. But many citizens of Sarajevo are bitter that he was able to live on the lam for 13 years before he was detained.
Jul 22nd, 2008 · Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic was arrested Monday in Serbia on genocide and other war crimes charges. He had evaded capture for more than a decade. Deborah Amos talks to Dejan Anastasijevic, a Serbian journalist in Belgrade, about Serbian reaction.
Jul 21st, 2008 · Former Bosnian Serb President Radovan Karadzic has been arrested. He has been twice indicted for genocide for the siege of Sarajevo and the massacre Muslims at Srebrenica. Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright calls the arrest "extremely significant."
Dec 31st, 2007 · In the summer of 1914, a Serbian nationalist named Gavrilo Prinzep went to the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo to view the Archduke Ferdinand of Austria and his bride, the Duchess of Hohenberg. Prinzep, a 20-year-old student, brought along a homemade bomb and a magazine pistol. The first time he saw the royal entourage approaching, Prinzep readied his bomb but lost his nerve. Later in the day, after another would-be assassin had disrupted the Archduke's planned route, Prinzep got another chance. This time he stepped from the crowd with his gun and shot the Archduke and Duchess dead. That assassination more than 90 years ago dominated the news worldwide, much as the murder of Benazir Bhutto has done. In both cases, many Americans wondered why an event so far away should be such a big deal. Both slayings were dramatic and brazen, carried out in broad daylight against public figures of international renown and consequence. But the victims were not their respective countries' actual leaders, only prospective ones. And the meaning of their deaths for the United States seemed obscure. If most Americans had not even heard of them, what difference could their demise really make to us? Of course we know now what followed Prinzep's political act. An international crisis escalated into the multi-front conflagration known as the Great War (and later as the First World War). It cost the lives of millions and profoundly altered history -- not only in Europe but around the globe. It also set the stage for the even greater catastrophe that was the Second World War, the effects of which are still reverberating in our time. For the moment, the consequences of Bhutto's death are on an entirely different scale. Her party and supporters are devastated, the national elections may be postponed and the chances for a healthy Pakistani democracy have been set back. But so far the damage done is primarily to one country and its hopes. The greater danger arises if, as the current unrest continues, repression follows and exacerbates the crisis. Many fear the country could descend into chaos, empowering elements of violent jihadism present in the current political mix. That would have profound implications for the U.S. mission in Afghanistan, and that's just for starters. Pakistan is the only country with both a nuclear arsenal and an immediate prospect of takeover by Islamic militants. And that implies a worst case scenario in our century quite worthy of comparison to those of the last. A Pakistani government or military beholden to such radical forces might use these weapons of mass destruction against longtime rival India -- or against others farther away in Israel, Europe and the United States. Missiles are not the only means of delivering smaller nukes, especially if a rogue state were in league with terrorists willing and able to provide alternative means. It is also possible that such a government might merely threaten to use its nuclear warheads, provoking a pre-emptive strike. Several countries that might consider themselves potential targets already have nukes of their own. So the next weeks and months in Pakistan and its region may well pose diplomatic challenges of exactly the kind the world's leaders failed to meet in 1914. Prinzep's act set off an explosion that had been in the making for generations. The Balkans of 1914 bred tension and hostility and the rest of Europe seemed eager to catch the fever. The volatile ingredients included ethnic and religious conflict, the competing ambitions of great powers and the deadly momentum of a long-running arms race. All these deadly elements are present today in the region on the rim of the Arabian Sea; and they are just as present among the more distant powers that choose to play here. The tragedy of 1914 was not just that the worst happened but that it might have been prevented. Diplomats who could have sought accommodation delivered ultimatums instead. Governments and peoples that might have seen a larger picture were driven to presume the worst of each other. So every nation mobilizing and rushing its forces to the front believed it did so in its own defense; and each such action was interpreted by the other side as a provocation (and as proof their suspicions were correct). Today the rivalries of old, dead empires seem antique to us, and much in the world has changed. Today's conflict is not so much about territory as about resources, less about politics than culture. But we still suffer from smallness of vision in trying to resolve these conflicts, and we are captives of our outdated concept of victory -- just as Europe was in 1914.
Feb 1st, 2007 · Zlata Filipovic kept a diary in war-torn Sarajevo that chronicled her harrowing war experiences. Fifteen years later, she's collected an array of young people's war diaries, from World War II to Iraq. Filipovic and co-editor Melanie Challenger talk about Stolen Voices.
Feb 21st, 2006 · Gen. Ratko Mladic, a Bosnian Serb wanted by the U.N. War Crimes Tribunal, has reportedly been located after 10 years on the run. In 1995, Mladic was indicted for his alleged role in genocide in Sarajevo and in the Srebrenica massacre. Dejan Anastasijevic, a Serbian journalist with Vreme, talks with Melissa Block.
Nov 19th, 2005 · NPR's Scott Simon muses on the new poetry collection of deposed Serbian leader Radovan Karadzic. In 1995, the U.N. war crimes tribunal indicted Karadzic, a Bosnian Serb, for his role in a 1995 massacre in Srebrenica and the 1992 siege of Sarajevo. He remains in hiding.
May 9th, 2005 · Alex Chadwick talks with writer Bill Carter about his experience in Sarajevo during the mid-1990s, when the city was under siege by Bosnian Serbs. Carter chronicled his time there in his new book, Fools Rush In: A True Story of Love, War and Redemption.