File:War damage on Sarajevo buildings (14024736919).jpg

The Bosnian War was characterised by shelling of cities and towns, ethnic cleansing, and systematic mass rape. What became iconic of the Bosnian War was the Siege of Sarajevo - the longest siege in modern European history, as it lasted over 3 years (including occasional ceasefires). Due to an UN-imposed embargo, the already well-equipped Serbian soldiers faced a poorly equipped Bosnian army, that nevertheless never gave up the city, while its civilian inhabitants had to hide from sniper and artillery fire, and continued to starve. The inhabitants like to emphasise how they were all in it together, regardless of whether they were Muslim, Orthodox (Serbian), or Catholic (Croatian). This is in defiance of what the commander of besieging forces, Bosnian Serbian psychiatrist and poet Radovan Karadžić, once said - that multi-ethnic Bosnia would never last. Bosnian TV and Radio never referred to the agressors simply as Serbs, but always Karadžić Serbs or the Chetniks; there were also Serbs fighting on the Bosnian side (such as Jovan Divjak). [13] As the siege dragged on however, people did become somewhat less tolerant. [3] Later, some foreign Muslim charity organisation even refused to help non-Muslim survivors of the siege. [3] In the photo, a few of the many nondescript Communist era buildings damaged by artillery and sniper fire.