Some 22 years after it was destroyed by Bosnian Serb forces' shelling during the 1992-1995 war, Sarajevo's famed architectural jewel, City Hall reopened on Friday.
Some 22 years after it was destroyed by Bosnian Serb forces' shelling during the 1992-1995 war, Sarajevo's famed architectural jewel, "City Hall" reopened on Friday. "It is the symbol of our strength to overcome the past and our hope for a better future," Sarajevo's mayor Ivo Komsic said at the opening ceremony after the sounds of Beethoven's "Ode to Joy."
In August 1992, Bosnian Serb gunners, who kept Sarajevo under a three-and-a-half-year long siege, targeted the library, built in 1896 in a pseudo-Moorish style, almost burning it to the ground.
The reconstruction work began in 1996, with the European Union investing nine ($12.3 million) of the 12 million euros needed to restore the building.
"Dear Sarajevans, the library has been reborn from its ashes," said top international official in Bosnia Valentin Inzko .
And Bakir Izetbegovic, the Muslim member of Bosnia's joint presidency, hailed a "triumph of civilisation over barbarism."
"Today, on May 9, Europe's day and the anniversary of victory over fascism, we have returned a real architectural and historic jewel to the citizens of Sarajevo and Bosnia," he said.
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More than 100,000 people, mostly Muslims, were killed during the inter-ethnic war in Bosnia.
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But only 300,000 books were spared from the flames.
After the end of the war, the building became a seat of the municipal administration. Now, it will house the library, city council and a museum.
Source-AFP