Dubrovnik

Hoteles destruidos durante la guerra

Medieval Dubrovnik under siege

Published: October 30, 1991

The people of Dubrovnik, once confident their medieval walls and Renaissance treasures would protect them from war, are now enduring the fears and hardships of life under seige.

Some 50,000 men, women and children are still in Dubrovnik, a Croatian city built on a promontory that is now cut off from outside world except for a few boats that get through by sea.

The city, which dates from the 7th century, has been under siege by Montenegro units of the Serbian-led Federal Army since Oct. 1 and now has little water and almost no electricity.

The residents line up to get their daily ration of 1.3 gallons of water per family from a fire truck in the Stradun, the city's marble main street.

Outside the baroque cathedral the townspeople jostle one another to get powdered milk, rice and cornflakes being dispensed from the back of a truck.

"Just look at me," said Mladen, a 15-year-old boy, pointing to bruises on his face and neck, souvenirs of a lost fight with a group of middle-aged women to get food supplies.

"People waste a whole day waiting in line for milk and potatoes and then at night sit in the dark," said Liljana Crnjak, 30, a shop owner. "If you have a candle, you can read at night."

Like many others in the city of winding medieval streets and 16th-century colonnades and buildings, she never imagined the war in Yugoslavia would come to this city.

"When I watched the war on television it was like watching a terrible program from another country," she said.

More than 1,000 Croatians have been killed since Croatia declared its independence on June 25, and an unknown number of soldiers from the federal Yugoslav Army and the local Serbian militias. Some estimates put the total figure as high as 5,000 dead, with 10,000 wounded and 350,000 made homeless.

Fighting in rebel Croatia claimed 16 more lives today as the Yugoslav forces stepped up aerial and artillery bombardments of the Danube town of Vukovar.

The historic center of Dubrovnik, with its church towers, domed roofs and colonnaded courtyards, has been lightly hit, with only minor damage to the main tourist attractions like the Stradum, Boskoviceva Street, the Rupe museum and a 700-year-old synagogue that had four broken windows.

But the plight of the city's residents could worsen. A fireman dispensing water to an eager crowd said there was only enough drinking water for two more weeks. "We don't like to think about what will happen when the water runs out," said Stanka Kordello, head of the local Red Cross.