http://www.euronews.com/ Sarajevo is a city which over the centuries has been called the Jerusalem of Europe – a symbol of multi-cultural and ethnic unity where those of Muslim, Catholic, Orthodox and Jewish faith lived together.

But in April 1992, it became another symbol: one of the tragic wars that erupted when Yugoslavia broke apart and nationalism and ethnic hatred pointed its guns to this city.

For more than three and a half years, Sarajevo was under siege. The Bosnia Serb army, with its Yugoslav heavy artillery, surrounded the Bosnian capital. Civilians became open targets for the snipers.

When the siege ended in February 1996, more than 11,000 Sarajevans had been killed. Thousands more had been wounded and displaced. Sarajevo, like Bosnia and Herzegovina, became more divided along ethnic lines.

These photographs of Sarajevo during the siege are part of a permanent exhibition at the city’s history museum.

It shows how Sarajevans lived during the war. Because they were surrounded and because of the UN arms embargo, not only was defending the city difficult but also getting food, water and electricity were all part of a daily struggle.

But for many Sarajevans the feeling of isolation was worse. Of an international community, especially the west, which reacted too slowly and too late to stop the siege.

Elma Hasimbegovic of the History Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina explains, “That was a major issue or major accusation that the people of Sarajevo were left by the world, let down, left to survive on their own, fight on their own. And I think as an example, I could point out the monument here in front of the museum. It shows the food can which was donated during the siege, ICAR can, the beef can done by a Bosnia artist who expresses I think in the best way this feeling of loneliness we had. We were given food, we were given humanitarian aid to have food to survive, but left to be killed.

But the west did eventually react with NATO bombings that led to the 1995 Dayton peace accords which ended the war.

Yet, during the war, help did come in the form of thousands of foreign soldiers from the Middle East and Afghanistan.

Most of them left after 1996, but funding from Muslim countries poured in to help rebuild a shattered city and country.

Today some of that aid has come under increased scrutiny. Especially from countries like Saudi Arabia said to finance only mosques and islamic organisations and schools whose aim is to spread a stricter or more fundamentalist version of Islam.

Mustafa Ceric has been the grand mufti of Bosnia since 1993. For him, this scrutiny is unfair.

“What is wrong with influence? We are influenced here by everybody. So you should tell me which of the influences are good for bosnia and which influences are not good for Bosnia. But I have one experience of course and one truth that people have a hard time to accept. If it had not been for the muslim help for us in Bosnia and Herzegovina, I would not be speaking to you. And I don’t accept and I dont allow anyone to put us into this moral suicide to blame those who helped us and now to run after those who did not help us when it was necessary,” he said.

Today it’s estimated that 80 per cent of Sarajevans are of Muslim faith – a third more than before the war.

Esad Hecimovic wrote a book about the mujahadeen who came to Bosnia during the war. He says most of them left and they are not a threat to Bosnia’s more moderate version of Islam.

He claims if anything, it was the collapse of Yugoslavia and its communist system that opened Bosniaks to meeting Muslims with a very different interpretation of Islam.

“Some of them asked for purification of Islam in Bosnia because our understanding of Islam was too close to Christian people. It was also against some beliefs of Islamic missionaries and fighters who came to Bosnia during the war. But it was just a marginal development. The primary reason for our conlict in Bosnia was ethnic: ethnic conflict and inability of political leaders to make constitution to share power between different ethnic groups,” he said.

Jovan Divjak was a general in the Yugoslav army when the war erupted. Here he shows us where Bosnian Serbs and the Bosnian army fought for control of the city.

For Divjak, an ethnic Serb, there was never a question of leaving Sarajevo, its people and the multi-cultural spirit which he wrote about in his book “Sarajevo mon amour”. His bravery earned him trust and mistrust from both sides.

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