Rüdiger Rossig | Journalist | Novinar

The war in Bosnia-Herzegovina ended a quarter century ago. Fixing the complicated state that emerged from that conflict requires outside investment, particularly from Europe, writes DW's Rüdiger Rossig.

On Thursday, December 14, 1995, the Dayton Accords were formally signed in Paris, ending the bloody war in Bosnia-Herzegovina. On that day, a US military officer entered the facilities of the TV station for the UN peacekeeping forces, UNTV, in the Croatian capital, Zagreb, where I was working at the time.

He said he had a question about his next deployment. Since 1992, the Blue Helmets had tried in vain to stop the war in neighboring Bosnia-Herzegovina. Now, a NATO contingent to which this officer belonged was meant to keep the peace there. 

"I have heard that there are proud Muslims, Croats and Serbs there. But who are the Bosnians?" he asked.

By this time, my UNTV colleagues and I had been reporting about the Bosnian war for 3 1/2 years. The republic, which had formed part of Yugoslavia until 1992, was in the news every day all over Europe. So we all laughed heartily at the American's naive question.

Later, however, I realized that this US officer had put his finger on precisely the dilemma in which Bosnia-Herzegovina remains stuck to this day: Too many of its 3.5 million citizens are not just lacking pride in their state, they don't even want to be Bosnians. More ...