Sarajevo's version of Romeo and Juliet

Finding humanity in the midst of inhumanity is paramount to exploring beyond the cold and impersonal statistics of tragic events like the conflict in Bosnia. One such news story, and the subsequent documentary on the personal backgrounds of the victims and their families, stands out in my memory.

In May 1993, over a year into the bloody Siege of Sarajevo, a story emerged that recaptured the attention of the world after months of horrific stories of suffering there and elsewhere in Bosnia-Herzegovina had become commonplace.

A young couple, a 24 year-old Serb, Bosko Brckic, and his girlfriend, Admira Ismic, a Muslim, were killed by snipers while attempting to flee the city. Bosko was killed instantly, while Admira was mortally wounded. She survived long enough to clutch her lifeless boyfriend before dying. Their bodies remained together in no-man’s-land on the Vrbana bridge for four days, until Serb fighters forced several Muslim prisoners to recover the bodies in the middle of the night.

The graves of Bosko and Admira in Lion Cemetery,  Sarajevo. The remains of reporter Kurt Schork are buried next to them.

One of the journalists who wrote about the incident, Kurt Schork, was later killed in 2000, while working on assignment during  the civil war in Sierra Leone. As per his wishes, he was cremated and a portion of his ashes are buried next to the couple’s grave.

In 1994, while the war was still in progress, the PBS program Frontline broadcast an in-depth documentary on the incident. The documentary interviewed family and friends of the couple, exploring some of the economic and ethical dilemmas that people are confronted with daily during wartime. Such “grey areas” included dealings with powerful criminal elements, the black market, mandatory service, suspicions of shifting allegiances, and betrayal. Here is the entire piece, though the audio is a bit distorted in the opening few minutes, it is still discernible, .

Radio Free Europe featured a piece on the production of a music video made by a classic Yugoslav rock band 20 years after event:

http://www.rferl.org/content/bosnia-love-story-sarajevo-war/24990732.html