Old Bridge in Mostar is rebuilt

[Ivo Skoric]

As those who blew the 16th year old cultural monument to pieces now, 
finally, surrendered to The Hague tribunal, and the bridge in Mostar 
is rebuilt in its old glory with help of Turkey, Germany, and 
Croatia, is the Mostar going to follow through by becoming a multi-
cultural city it once was?
http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/story.jsp?story=512234

This is an article I wrote in 1993, when I learned of the bridge 
destruction, shocked by the disappearing image on Ted Koppel's 
Nightline...
http://balkansnet.org/bridge.txt

An important observation from the first article (by Marcus Tanner):
"Pre-war Mostar was roughly 40 per cent Muslim, 40 per cent Croat and 
20 per cent Serb. But the war drove a coach and horses through the 
percentages. Apart from the virtual disappearance of the Serbs, an 
influx of Croats from central Bosnia and the departure of some 
Muslims from the largely jobless east, it has changed the ethnic 
balance. Mostar has a Croatian majority now.

The knowledge of this has turned many former political calculations 
on their head. Until a few years ago, the Muslim east - the larger of 
the two communities for several years after the war - championed a 
reunited Mostar with the Old Bridge at its centre. Now that the 
Muslims have become a minority, enthusiasm for unity has waned and 
the Muslim-led Party for Democratic Action seems reluctant to embrace 
Mr Ashdown's reunified city council.

On the other side, a shift in perception is equally striking. Once 
almost paranoid in their opposition to any contact with the east, the 
Bosnian Croats have shed their fear of reunification now they know 
they could outvote the Muslims in a city-wide election. They no 
longer resent the Old Bridge, for its symbolism has changed. It has 
become harmless - a potential draw for the tourists who once flocked 
to Mostar but have not been seen since the 1980s."