Zlata’s Diary: Introduction

I found out that Zlata was a thirteen-year-old girl, living with her parents, who had been keeping a diary since September 1991, a few months before the first barricades went up in the city and the heavy shelling began.

Her family was comfortably well-off, the apartment in which her parents had lived for twenty years was spacious and elegant with a view of the river, and they had neighbors, relatives and friends nearby who were constantly dropping in.

Within a couple of months of Zlata’s first diary entry, Serbian artillery positions were set up on the hills directly above her house and the family had to move all their possessions into the front room, which was protected from shrapnel by sandbags.

Within a couple of months of Zlata’s first diary entry, Serbian artillery positions were set up on the hills directly above her house and the family had to move all their possessions into the front room, which was protected from shrapnel by sandbags.

At that point, Bosnians who could leave the city fled; others refused to go, not really believing that their city would be reduced to rubble.

Zlata watched with disbelief as her friends and relatives tried desperately to flee before it was too late.

She could not comprehend the issues that had become all-important: ethnic cleansing, the Geneva talks, Lord Owen and the division of Bosnia.

Her mother, a chemist, began to slip into a state of gloom and despair as the family spent day after day cowering in the cellar while heavy artillery ravaged Sarajevo.

Her mother, a chemist, began to slip into a state of gloom and despair as the family spent day after day cowering in the cellar while heavy artillery ravaged Sarajevo.

Her mother, a chemist, began to slip into a state of gloom and despair as the family spent day after day cowering in the cellar while heavy artillery ravaged Sarajevo.

Before the war, she had been a diligent student studying English, music, math and literature, but because the Serbs often targeted schools and playgrounds, school was stopped—it was too dangerous to walk the few blocks to attend classes.

We sat on a wall and when a shell fell I noticed that she did not flinch.

I thought then that she seemed more adult, more resigned and stoical, than most of the adults I knew.

I thought then that she seemed more adult, more resigned and stoical, than most of the adults I knew.

But the area was deep in the territory of a warlord who was notorious for stealing cars and flak jackets and for dragging Bosnians out of their cars and forcing them to dig trenches.

But the area was deep in the territory of a warlord who was notorious for stealing cars and flak jackets and for dragging Bosnians out of their cars and forcing them to dig trenches.

I used my Deutsche Marks to buy all I could find on the black market: the selection was pathetic, but I knew that Zlata and her parents would welcome anything.

So I climbed the stairs to their apartment with a few bags of wilted vegetables, a few cans of Coke, some chocolate, a few cans of meat, some candles.

When I talked to Zlata later about food, she reminisced about all the wonderful things that she used to eat, and then laughing, said, “Stop! That’s enough!”

Perhaps it was the confidence inspired by her family life that gave her the will to endure the horrors that were taking place on her doorstep.

All of them were traumatized and shell-shocked.

I spoke to psychiatrists who talked of post-traumatic stress syndrome and the effect of the war on all these children.

Zlata was different: she was suffering, but because she was recording the events taking place around her, she tended to see the world from a slightly detached viewpoint.

There are hundreds of thousands like her in Bosnia: besieged, frightened, their short lives suddenly ground to a halt.

However, on December 23, 1993, Zlata and her parents were transported from their home in the Skenderija district of old Sarajevo in two armored vehicles of the French UNPROFOR contingent and taken through government and Serb checkpoints at the airport.