By Peter.
Over three decades after the Siege of Sarajevo, Italian prosecutors in Milan have opened a chilling investigation into allegations that affluent Italian tourists paid hefty sums to join “human safaris,” firing on trapped civilians in the besieged Bosnian capital.
Court filings reveal the suspects—some linked to far-right networks—allegedly paid the Bosnian Serb army roughly £70,000 each for weekend “hunting excursions” during the 1990s war. The men reportedly flew from Italy, climbed to sniper nests on Sarajevo rooftops, and shot at defenseless residents below.
In a particularly gruesome detail, authorities claim participants could pay extra to target children.
At the siege’s peak, relentless gunfire turned two major arteries—Ulica Zmaja od Bosne and Meša Selimović Boulevard—into the notorious “Sniper Alley.” Desperate locals dashed across exposed intersections for food or water while snipers on the hills picked them off.
Milan journalist Ezio Gavazzeni called the accused “prominent businessmen who paid to murder unarmed people during the siege, then flew home from Trieste to their polished lives.”
Italian and Bosnian officials estimate over 100 people may have joined these sniper outings. Witnesses could soon be summoned as the probe expands, backed by Bosnian intelligence evidence placing Italian nationals in firing positions around the city.
Bosnian consul in Milan, Dag Dumrukcic, vowed full cooperation: “We will confront the past. I have information ready for the investigation.”
From 1992 to 1996, Sarajevo endured severed water, gas, and power while under ceaseless shelling—one of the bleakest episodes of the Bosnian War. Ex-Bosnian Serb leaders Radovan Karadžić and Stanislav Galić were later convicted of war crimes for masterminding the siege; both are serving life sentences—Karadžić in the UK, Galić in Germany.
By the siege’s end in 1995, some 13,952 lives were lost, including 5,434 civilians. The Milan inquiry seeks belated accountability for one of Europe’s most harrowing modern atrocities.
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