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Article: New Enemy Attacks Sarajevo - Winter; Besieged Bosnian Capital Is Stripped for Scraps of Firewood
- Article from:
- The Washington Post
- Article date:
- December 29, 1992
- Author:
CopyrightThis material is published under license from the Washington Post. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Washington Post. (Hide copyright information)
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Desperate to stay alive, the freezing people of Sarajevo have
begun to devour what's left of their shattered city.
Trees in parks and along once stately boulevards are being cut
down at a hurricane pace as men, women and children scavenge for
firewood. Buildings shelled by Serb forces besieging the city are
being stripped of anything that burns - beams, flooring, roofing,
wallpaper, foam insulation.
Usually, it is government militiamen with chainsaws who fell the
decades-old trees and appropriate the biggest chunks. Civilian men
with axes cut up the branches, then grandmothers and children move
in, scurrying around to pick up the twigs.
"It's cold, and we have to stay alive, so we cut ...