Category: Stories

Two years after Bosnia and Herzegovina joined a European-wide effort to reform, improve and unify universities, the country ranks dead-last among 45 participants in reaching that goal. Higher education in BiH remains under-funded and over politicized. Professors too often teach boring classes and do little research. Students increasingly are moving to private colleges – or to classes in other countries.

It took years of effort, but at a contentious July meeting in South Africa, Mostar’s Old Town was finally added to the United Nation’s World Heritage List, giving it status as a unique cultural place on the globe.

A lifeline into and out of a city under siege a decade ago, a tunnel beneath the Sarajevo airport forgotten by residents and snubbed by officials as a historical memorial, has nevertheless become an unlikely magnet for tourists.

Why has a country full of buried treasures lost the will to exploit them? Too often, archeological wonders beneath the surface of BiH stay unstudied or are allowed to decay unless international scientists get involved.

As the Sarajevo Film Festival, which brings worldwide attention to the work of regional filmmakers, wound down this weekend, some BiH filmmakers were asking why most of this year”s limited funding from the Film Foundation went to Croatian directors.