Shocking new details have emerged concerning reports that rich tourists paid staggering amounts of money to shoot innocent people during the Siege of Sarajevo in Bosnia (1992-1996) in a twisted ‘human safari’.
Horrifying reports have shed light on the appalling rumors, with a new book claiming that wealthy, would-be murderers shelled out exorbitant amounts of cash and competed to see who could gun down the most beautiful women.
The siege of Sarajevo, which lasted from 1992 to 1996, was the longest of any capital city in modern history, leaving more than 11,000 people dead from sniper fire, shelling, and other wartime atrocities.
Last year reports emerged that groups of wealthy foreign nationals turned the tragedy into a deadly thrill ride, in what has been chillingly dubbed a “human safari.”
Italian journalist and novelist Ezio Gavazzeni filed a 17-page complaint with Milan prosecutors, alleging that “very wealthy people” traveled to Sarajevo for the chance to kill defenseless civilians for sport.
“There were Germans, French, English … people from all Western countries who paid large sums of money to be taken there to shoot civilians,” Gavazzeni told The Guardian.
“There were no political or religious motives. They were rich people who went there for fun and personal satisfaction.”
A new book penned by Croatian journalist Domagoj Margetic, titled Pay and Shoot, expands upon the grisly claims, alleging that Serbian handlers were paid around 80,000 Deutsche marks (about $53,000 US between 1992 and 1996) by sick tourists.
Shooting young, attractive women had a reported price tag of 95,000 marks (about $61,000). Meanwhile, the price to shoot women who were pregnant was set at 110,000 marks, or $72,000.
In an interview with The Times, Margetic revealed that Pay and Shoot was written with the help of documents shared by Bosnian intelligence officer Nedzad Ugljen, who was killed in 1996.
“Ugljen also wrote the foreigners competed to see who could shoot the most beautiful women,” Margetic said.
Having spoken with members of the Bosnian-Serb militia, the journalist claimed a member of one of Europe’s royal families took part in the shooting.
“Many of them told me a European royal was among the shooters. He would arrive by helicopter, stay in Vogosca near Sarajevo, and wanted to shoot at children,” Margetic claimed.
According to Margetic, the unfathomable scheme was not a back-street enterprise organized by low-level criminals, but “an activity handled by the security services because foreigners were involved.”
Witnesses have previously described “Sniper Alley,” one of the city’s deadliest streets, where civilians were regularly targeted.
A former Bosnian intelligence officer corroborated that Italian intelligence knew of these “safaris” as early as 1993. Meanwhile, U.S. Marine John Jordan testified to the UN tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in 2007, recalling seeing a foreigner handle a heavy weapon “like a novice,” describing it as more suited for wild boar hunting than urban combat.
Yet the shocking claims are not without controversy. Members of the British forces stationed in and around Sarajevo at the time told the BBC that they never encountered such “tourist snipers,” describing the stories as possibly “urban myths.”
One soldier noted that the logistics of bringing in paid civilians to shoot in a war zone would have been extremely difficult, given the city’s multiple checkpoints and ongoing conflict.
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