Photographs show the impact of war in Bosnia

Seeing mention recently of Ratko Miladic stirred some unwanted memories. I saw for myself the destruction of Sarajevo and the fighting between Bosnian Muslims and Croats — houses burning, graves, the mercenaries and much, much worse.

Quite by chance, as I was scanning a collection of cemetery snaps that had arrived from America, I opened a battered wallet of photographs. It had a sticky label on it, marked Bosnia 10. It jogged my memory and I remembered that I had taken hundreds of Kodachrome transparencies and even more 35mm negatives recording what I saw. They sit in a storage box waiting to be looked at.

Here are few of my images. These are just snapshots and not my best work, but they do illustrate a little of the massive destruction that took place. I used to describe such snaps as record or evidential shots. Think of them as a rare glimpse into one of my previous lives! Enlarge the page to see more detail in the images. All images © Laurie Manton.

Not wishing to bore you, I will recount just one tale of the inhumane acts that took place in the conflict. The second image shows an overgrown garden in front of a wrecked house. It reminded me of an incident that affected me greatly.

I recall being driven up country from Gorni Vakuf. On the outskirts of the town, a woman was hanging up her washing on a line in the garden that surrounded her home. Her toddlers played by her feet. Smiling, she waved to me and I waved back. When I came back from the front two…