Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, August 15, 1993 TAG: 9308150038
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOHN F. BURNS THE NEW YORK TIMES
DATELINE: SARAJEVO, BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA LENGTH: Long
How they do has been a mystery, because the supplies brought through and flown over the siege lines have never amounted to more than a fraction of the needs.
The city's survival, months after many thought it would fall, has not been solely a matter of ingenuity, although people here have been strikingly inventive in overcoming the privations. Nor is it only a matter of black marketeering through gaps in the siege lines, exploited by Serbs on the outside and Muslims on the inside.
The crucial secret has been a tunnel, a lifeline about 700 yards long, dug over months, mostly by hand, that runs underneath the Sarajevo Airport.
By connecting two suburbs held by Bosnian government troops, one inside the Serbian siege lines and the other outside, the tunnel has penetrated the siege more effectively than anything else.
It has therefore been treated as a secret, although those who have traveled through it, now numbering many thousands, have talked enough about their experiences to make the secrecy effectively moot.
Even now, although it has been operating for many months, the story of the tunnel cannot be fully told, in part because no reporters have been allowed to pass through it, or even to interview the people who built it.
What is known about it seems certain to become part of the legend of the siege.
The tunnel is one segment of a lifeline that runs from Muslim territory southwest of Sarajevo, over Mount Igman, through Hrasnica and Butmir, two Bosnian-held outposts on the south side of the airport, and then across the airport to another Bosnian-controlled area, Dobrinja. It has provided supplies, a safe route to hospitals for the wounded and even a path of escape.
This, the people say, is the real significance of battle for Mount Igman, and of the U.N. pact that replaces the Bosnian forces there.
Like many improvisations born of necessity in the siege, the tunnel is a Rube Goldberg affair, propped up with wooden stanchions and lined with planks. Those who have passed through it say it is excruciatingly cramped, so low that a man must stoop to walk through it and so narrow that only one person can travel it at a time in either direction.
Sarajevo has long been without electricity, so the tunnel's only light comes from users' flashlights. There is no ventilation, and air in the tunnel is sparse and fetid, forcing everybody who enters it to wear gas masks.
One man who made the trip recently, a Bosnian soldier sent to reinforce units defending Mount Igman, said conditions are so perilous that only people judged strong enough are permitted to try it.
"It took me 20 minutes, and I was exhausted," the man said. "Once you are in there, you are on your own, no way of communicating, nothing but a flashlight. The air is so dank you think you are going to die."
The tunnel entrances are in Dobrinja and Butmir, Bosnian-held suburbs north of the airport.
Both are ringed by trenches manned by Bosnian troops, who are said to be keenly aware that keeping Serbian forces away may be the key to Sarajevo's survival. Although Serbian forces have bombarded Dobrinja as heavily as any part of Sarajevo, and have mounted several tank and infantry assaults on Butmir, they have not so far gotten close enough to threaten the tunnel entrances.
According to high-ranking Bosnian military officers, the tunnel has been used to bring ammunition for tanks and other heavy weapons used by Sarajevo's Bosnian defenders. It has also been used to bring wounded soldiers into Sarajevo, where there are two major hospitals.
Although the tunnel has not been mentioned by the newspapers in Sarajevo or the radio and television stations controlled by the Bosnian government, its existence has been no secret to the Serbian commanders.
An article this summer in Slobodna Dalmacija, a newspaper in the Croatian city of Split, said the Serbian commander in Bosnia, Lt. Gen. Ratko Mladic, had filed a protest about the tunnel with the U.N. force in Bosnia, which took control of Sarajevo Airport from Serbian forces in July last year.
U.N. officials have denied knowledge of the protest, perhaps because the issue touches on interpretations of the accord signed when U.N. troops took control of the airport to enable the airlift of food and medicines.
The agreement limits the use of the airport to activities in support of the U.N. mission, and forbids Bosnian soldiers or civilians from crossing it without Serbian approval in advance.
While the tunnel is a lifeline, it is coming to symbolize for some the decaying quality of life in Sarajevo.
Some say control of the tunnel lies with Muslim commanders of irregular military units who are said to have imposed steep tolls.
One man said Saturday that he had been told to bring 200 German marks, about $120, to pay for the passage of his wife and two small children. For most people in Sarajevo, where wartime inflation has made the Bosnian currency virtually worthless, any amount of foreign currency is nearly impossible to raise.
To those who know of the tunnel but are unable to raise the money, the tolls are a symptom of what they say is the dying legend of a Sarajevo where ethnic groups once lived together and neighbors shared.
"Sarajevo is no more civilization city," one man said, speaking broken English as he described his efforts to get his family through the tunnel. "Now, no more is heart, no more is love for Sarajevo. All is money, all is for self."
by CNB