Bosnian War and tourist snipers

Today, I got in my FB feed a mention of tourist sniping for pay by Westerners during the Bosnian War, apparently mostly an Italian thing (with about 200+ Italian wealthy snipers), but possibly some Americans and Russians as well:

The public prosecutor's office in Milan has opened an investigation into claims that Italian citizens travelled to Bosnia on "sniper safaris" during the war in the early 1990s.

Italians and others are alleged to have paid large sums to shoot at civilians risking their lives to cross the city's main boulevard.

The Milan complaint was filed by journalist and novelist Ezio Gavazzeni, who describes a "manhunt" by "very wealthy people" with a passion for weapons who "paid to be able to kill defenceless civilians" from Serb positions in the hills around Sarajevo.

Different rates were charged to kill men, women or children, according to some reports.

More than 11,000 people died during the brutal four-year siege of Sarejevo.

Yugoslavia was torn apart by war and the city was surrounded by Serb forces and subjected to constant shelling and sniper fire.

Similar allegations about "human hunters" from abroad have been made several times over the years, but the evidence gathered by Gavazzeni, which includes the testimony of a Bosnian military intelligence officer, is now being examined by Italian counter terrorism prosecutor Alessandro Gobbis.

The charge is murder.

The Bosnian officer apparently revealed that his Bosnian colleagues found out about the so-called safaris in late 1993 and then passed on the information to Italy's Sismi military intelligence in early 1994.

The response from Sismi came a couple of months later. They found out that "safari" tourists would fly from the northern Italian border city of Trieste and then travel to the hills above Sarajevo.

"We've put a stop to it and there won't be any more safaris," the officer was told. Within two to three months the trips had stopped.

Ezio Gavazzeni, who usually writes about terrorism and the mafia, first read about the sniper tours to Sarajevo three decades ago when Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera reported the story, but without firm evidence.

He returned to the topic after seeing "Sarajevo Safari", a documentary film from 2022 by Slovenian director Miran Zupanic which alleges that those involved in the killings came from several countries, including the US and Russia as well as Italy.

Gavazzeni began to dig further and in February handed prosecutors his findings, said to amount to a 17-page file including a report by former Sarajevo mayor Benjamina Karic.

An investigation in Bosnia itself appears to have stalled.

Speaking to Italy's La Repubblica newspaper, Gavazzeni alleges that "many" took part in the practice, "at least a hundred" in all, with Italians paying "a lot of money" to do so, up to €100,000 (£88,000) in today's terms.

In 1992, late Russian nationalist writer and politician Eduard Limonov was filmed firing multiple rounds into Sarajevo from a heavy machine gun.

He was being given a tour of hillside positions by Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, who was later convicted of genocide by an international tribunal in the Hague.

Limonov didn't pay for his war tourism, though. He was there as an admirer of Karadzic, telling the so-called Butcher of Bosnia: "We Russians should take example from you."

The fact Milan prosecutors had opened a case was first reported back in July when Il Giornale website wrote that the Italians would arrive in the mountains by minivan, paying huge bribes to pass checkpoints as they went, pretending to be on a humanitarian mission.

After a weekend shooting in the war zone, they would return home to their normal lives.

Gavazzeni described their actions as the "indifference of evil".

Prosecutors and police are said to have identified a list of witnesses as they try to establish who might have been involved.

From Il Giornale:

Cecchini in trasferta in Bosnia, almeno 200 gli italiani che sparavano sui civili a Sarajevo C'è un ex militare dietro l'esposto da cui è partita l'indagine dei pm di Milano. Ecco chi erano e come si muovevano. L'inquietante tariffario: i bambini i più cari, i vecchi gratis Spunta un superteste militare e un macabro tariffario dietro i cecchini italiani - almeno 200 - che dal 1992 al 1996 avrebbero sparato sui civili inermi durante l’assedio di Sarajevo dopo essere arrivati in tuta mimetica da Triveneto, Piemonte o Lombardia, su pulmini partiti e tornati in 72 ore che attraversavano i check point sia in Croazia sia in Bosnia, quasi indisturbati, con la scusa della «missione umanitaria» e qualche generosa mazzetta per i loro Safari a Sarajevo. Come aveva anticipato il Giornale lo scorso 18 luglio c’è un'inchiesta aperta dalla Procura di Milano sui «cecchini del weekend» che da mezza Europa, Italia compresa, si facevano portare sulle colline intorno alla capitale bosniaca da una sorta di agenzia di viaggi che organizzava il trasferimento e che avrebbe fissato una tariffa per queste uccisioni: i bambini costavano di più, fino a 100 milioni delle vecchie lire, poi gli uomini (meglio in divisa e armati), le donne e infine i vecchi che si potevano uccidere gratis. Come sappiamo, l’assedio a Sarajevo è costato la vita a 11.541 civili (tra cui 1.601 bambini), la battaglia è stata paragonata all’assedio di Stalingrado della Seconda Guerra Mondiale. Molti dei cecchini erano piazzati nelle colline di Grbavica, la zona serba tagliata in due dal fiume Miljacka. Della presenza di italiani tra i cecchini si era parlato nel 1995 sul Corriere, senza sufficienti prove. Qualche anno fa la stessa tesi era stata rilanciata dal giornalista Luca Leone, co-fondatore di Infinito Edizioni e autore nel 2014 del romanzo «I bastardi di Sarajevo». Secondo l’esposto firmato dallo scrittore Ezio Gavazzeni assistito dall’ex pm Guido Salvini e depositato nei mesi scorsi sulla scrivania del pm Alessandro Gobbis, magistrato esperto specializzato nell’Antiterrorismo, ci sarebbe una fonte in Bosnia-Erzegovina che avrebbe riferito un particolare decisivo: già a fine 1993 l’intelligence bosniaca avrebbe avvertito la locale sede del Sismi (il servizio segreto militare, oggi Aise) della presenza di almeno 5 italiani, che si trovavano sulle colline intorno alla città, accompagnati per sparare ai civili. Ma i nostri connazionali coinvolti sarebbero almeno duecento. «La presenza dei nostri servizi segreti in loco era giustificata dalla presenza della missione delle Nazioni Unite chiamata Unprofor - si legge nell’esposto che il Giornale ha finalmente potuto consultare - della quale facevamo parte anche noi». La fonte sarebbe Edin Subašić, ex 007 che avrebbe lavorato per questa macabra agenzia di viaggi. I bersagli di solito non venivano uccisi subito, ma feriti gravemente in attesa che i soccorsi arrivassero per essere a loro volta colpiti. Nella testimonianza raccolta dalla fonte e depositata al pm si parla di un uomo di Torino, uno di Milano e uno di Trieste. Uno di loro sarebbe stato al tempo il proprietario di una clinica privata di Milano che si occupava di estetica. Di spietati europei che venivano portati a Sarajevo si parla anche nel documentario «Sarajevo Safari», dell’autore sloveno Miran Zupanic, presentato durante la rassegna cinematografica Al Jazeera Balkans Documentary Film Festival alla fine del 2022 e oggi disponibile a pagamento solo su Al Jazeera. Uno dei testimoni chiave nel documentario, che ha preferito rimanere anonimo, racconta di aver saputo dell’esistenza di «cacciatori di esseri umani» stranieri (americani, canadesi, russi, ma anche di italiani), disposti a pagare per «giocare» alla guerra. Una testimonianza che si sposa con la versione di Edin Subašić, secondo cui i cecchini sarebbero arrivati «attraverso l’Italia a Belgrado e poi a Pale, a pochi chilometri da Sarajevo dove risiedevano gli ufficiali dell’esercito serbo». Secondo la testimonianza, basata sul racconto di un volontario serbo catturato i cecchini/cacciatori sarebbero «partiti da Trieste e da lì arrivavano in Serbia, e poi a Sarajevo». I viaggi sarebbero stati effettuati «tramite un aereo da Trieste, poi attraverso elicotteri e veicoli dalla Serbia attraverso la zona di guerra fino a Sarajevo» attraverso «le infrastrutture dell’ex compagnia aerea serba di charter e turismo Aviogenex, che aveva una filiale a Trieste. Uno dei membri di questa organizzazione sarebbe Jovica Stanišić, condannato per crimini di guerra al Tribunale penale internazionale per l’ex Jugoslavia. L’identikit del cecchino sarebbe molto preciso: gente ricca, cacciatori appassionati dei classici safari legali, a caccia di adrenalina e di trofei «umani», amanti delle armi con profili di psicopatologie o sadismo, ex militari orfani dei campi di battaglia. Ci sarebbero ancora testimoni oculari vivi ma secondo le ricostruzioni in mano alla Procura sarebbero sottoposti a pressioni da parte dei servizi serbi per mantenere segreta l’intera operazione. Lo stesso sindaco di Sarajevo Benjamina Karić è in attrito con Ljubiša Ćosić, il sindaco filoserbo di Sarajevo Est che non ha intenzione di far perseguire alcuni serbi dai servizi segreti bosniaci. Ma anche la nostra intelligence potrebbe avere in mano qualche nome. Chissà come si muoverà adesso la Procura.

Snipers on a trip to Bosnia, at least 200 Italians firing on civilians in Sarajevo There is a former military man behind the complaint from which the investigation of the Milan prosecutors began. Here's who they were and how they moved. The disturbing price list: children are the dearest, the elderly are free A military superwitness and a macabre tariff appear behind the Italian snipers - at least 200 - who from 1992 to 1996 allegedly fired on unarmed civilians during the siege of Sarajevo after arriving in camouflage suits from Triveneto, Piedmont or Lombardy, on minibuses that left and returned in 72 hours that crossed the checkpoints both in Croatia and Bosnia, almost undisturbed, with the excuse of the "humanitarian mission" and a few generous bribes for their Safaris in Sarajevo. As Il Giornale had anticipated last July 18, there is an investigation opened by the Milan Public Prosecutor's Office on the "weekend snipers" who from half of Europe, including Italy, were taken to the hills around the Bosnian capital by a sort of travel agency that organized the transfer and that would have set a fee for these killings: the children cost more, up to 100 million of the old lire, then the men (better in uniform and armed), the women and finally the old people who could be killed for free. As we know, the siege of Sarajevo cost the lives of 11,541 civilians (including 1,601 children), the battle has been compared to the siege of Stalingrad in World War II. Many of the snipers were stationed in the hills of Grbavica, the Serbian area cut in two by the Miljacka River. The presence of Italians among the snipers had been talked about in 1995 in the Corriere, without sufficient evidence. A few years ago the same thesis was relaunched by journalist Luca Leone, co-founder of Infinito Edizioni and author in 2014 of the novel "The Bastards of Sarajevo". According to the complaint signed by the writer Ezio Gavazzeni assisted by the former prosecutor Guido Salvini and deposited in recent months on the desk of the prosecutor Alessandro Gobbis, an expert magistrate specialized in anti-terrorism, there would be a source in Bosnia-Herzegovina who would have reported a decisive detail: already at the end of 1993 the Bosnian intelligence would have warned the local headquarters of the SISMI (the military secret service, today Aise) of the presence of at least 5 Italians, who were on the hills around the city, accompanied to shoot civilians. But our compatriots involved would be at least two hundred. "The presence of our secret services on the spot was justified by the presence of the United Nations mission called UNPROFOR," reads the complaint that the newspaper was finally able to consult, "of which we were also part." The source would be Edin Subašić, former 007 who would have worked for this macabre travel agency. The targets were usually not killed immediately, but seriously injured while waiting for help to arrive to be hit in turn. In the testimony collected by the source and filed with the prosecutor, there is talk of a man from Turin, one from Milan and one from Trieste. One of them would have been the owner of a private clinic in Milan that dealt with aesthetics at the time. Ruthless Europeans who were brought to Sarajevo are also talked about in the documentary "Sarajevo Safari", by Slovenian author Miran Zupanic, presented during the Al Jazeera Balkans Documentary Film Festival at the end of 2022 and now available for a fee only on Al Jazeera. One of the key witnesses in the documentary, who preferred to remain anonymous, says he learned of the existence of foreign "hunters of human beings" (Americans, Canadians, Russians, but also Italians), willing to pay to "play" at war. A testimony that goes hand in hand with Edin Subašić's version, according to which the snipers arrived "through Italy in Belgrade and then in Pale, a few kilometers from Sarajevo where the officers of the Serbian army resided". According to the testimony, based on the account of a captured Serbian volunteer, the snipers/hunters "left Trieste and from there arrived in Serbia, and then in Sarajevo". The trips would have been made "by plane from Trieste, then by helicopters and vehicles from Serbia through the war zone to Sarajevo" through "the infrastructure of the former Serbian charter and tourism airline Aviogenex, which had a branch in Trieste. One of the members of this organization is said to be Jovica Stanišić, convicted of war crimes at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. The identity of the sniper would be very precise: rich people, hunters passionate about classic legal safaris, hunting for adrenaline and "human" trophies, gun lovers with profiles of psychopathology or sadism, former soldiers orphans of the battlefields. There would still be eyewitnesses alive but according to the reconstructions in the hands of the Prosecutor's Office they would be subjected to pressure from the Serbian services to keep the entire operation secret. Sarajevo Mayor Benjamina Karić himself is at odds with Ljubiša Ćosić, the pro-Serb mayor of East Sarajevo, who has no intention of having Bosnian intelligence agencies prosecute certain Serbs. But our intelligence services may also have some names in their possession. Who knows what the Prosecutor's Office will do next?