Prosecutors in Milan have opened an investigation into allegations that Italian nationals paid members of the Bosnian Serb army to shoot at civilians in Sarajevo during the city’s four-year siege in the 1990s.
The probe, led by prosecutor Alessandro Gobbi, concerns suspected crimes of voluntary homicide “aggravated by cruelty and vile motives”, according to judicial sources cited in Italian press reports. Investigators are seeking to identify Italian citizens who allegedly travelled to Bosnia & Herzegovina during the war to take part in what witnesses have described as a “human safari”.
The investigation was confirmed by Italian writer and journalist Ezio Gavazzeni, who filed the complaint, and former Sarajevo mayor Benjamina Karic.
More than 10,000 people were killed in Sarajevo between 1992 and 1996 — the longest siege of a capital city in modern history — following Bosnia’s declaration of independence from Yugoslavia.
A stretch of Sarajevo’s main boulevard became known as “Sniper Alley”, where residents were routinely targeted by gunfire from surrounding hills during the Bosnian War.
Allegations of “sniper tourism”
The Milan case originated from a complaint filed by Gavazzeni, who said he collected testimony suggesting that wealthy Westerners including Italians paid soldiers loyal to Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadžić for the chance to fire on civilians. Karadžić was convicted of genocide and other crimes against humanity by a UN tribunal in 2016.
According to Gavazzeni, the alleged participants paid the equivalent of €80,000 to €100,000 for weekend trips arranged through contacts in Trieste and Belgrade. Some reportedly paid more to target children. The suspects are said to include businessmen and professionals from northern Italian cities such as Milan, Turin and Trieste.
“There were no political or religious motivations,” Gavazzeni said as reported by The Guardian. “They were rich people who went there for fun and personal satisfaction. We are talking about people who love guns who perhaps go to shooting ranges or on safari in Africa.”
The Bosnian authorities initially investigated similar claims after the release of Sarajevo Safari, a 2022 documentary by Slovenian filmmaker Miran Zupanič, which featured testimonies from former soldiers who alleged that foreigners paid to shoot civilians from the hills. The Bosnian prosecutor’s office later shelved the case, citing a lack of evidence and the difficulty of pursuing such a complex investigation in a country still deeply divided by war.
Gavazzeni said he began examining the claims after watching Zupanič’s film, which revived reports first circulated in the 1990s about alleged “sniper tourists.” He has since gathered witness statements and other materials, which he submitted to Milan prosecutors earlier this year.
Sarajevo’s former mayor calls for justice
The current Milan investigation was also prompted by a report submitted by Benjamina Karić, mayor of Sarajevo from 2021 to 2024, who first filed a criminal complaint in Bosnia in 2022 after Sarajevo Safari was released.
“Our children deserve justice, after so many years,” Karić wrote in a Facebook post. “What seemed so distant and unrealistic to many in 2022 is today the topic of the world's media.”
Karić said she shared her documentation with the Italian embassy and later with Milan prosecutors after learning that the Bosnian investigation had stalled.
Judicial sources told Italian media that the Milan prosecutors’ office is now reviewing evidence to verify whether any of the identified Italians can be formally accused. Gavazzeni has claimed that “many” Italians were involved, as well as individuals of other nationalities including English, French and German.
No comments:
Post a Comment