Railway Connects Sarajevo to Croatian Coast, Opening Economic Prospects

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina —  A passenger train sputtered out of Sarajevo on Tuesday, reopening a key north-south railway and prospects of an economic recovery in Bosnia after 3 1/2 years of war.

Bosnian officials and foreign diplomats boarded the five-coach train headed for the Adriatic port of Ploce, Croatia, after a ceremony in which Bosnian President Alija Izetbegovic proclaimed: “This, today, is the second opening of the city.”

The Bosnian capital was under siege throughout the war and reopened this spring when Bosnian Serbs handed over five suburbs to the Muslim-Croat federation.

The United States, other countries and aid organizations gave $10 million in money and equipment to reconstruct the line.

Meanwhile, a key prosecution witness told the U.N. war crimes tribunal in The Hague that Bosnian Serb Dusan Tadic was not present during one of the grisliest crimes for which he stands accused.

Witness “H,” a 28-year-old Muslim with three young sons, told the court in closed session last Wednesday that he had never seen Tadic at the Serb-run Omarska prison camp in the Prijedor region of northwest Bosnia.

Also last Wednesday, however, another Muslim survivor of Omarska, Halid Mujkanovic, told the court that he saw Tadic among a group of about 10 Serbs present during a brutal sexual mutilation.