Thousands of cyclists rode through the Bosnian capital on Sunday (June 22) in a race sponsored by the Tour de France to promote peace a century since the Sarajevo assassination that was critical in setting off a chain of events that led to World War I.
The race was the first in a string of events to mark the June 28 centenary of the murder of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, in 1914.
That year's Tour de France began the same day, but was called off as Europe raced to war.
Forty-eight of the tour's cyclists, including three former winners since its start in 1903, were among more than 10 million soldiers who would die in the conflict.
“When the Tour de France organization asked me to come here, and it told me we are going out to celebrate the World War I, I went on Wikipedia to find out what was it about, and I realized how important the Tour de France was in World War I, that there were three Tour de France winners killed in the World War,” said Irish cyclist Stephen Roche, the 1987 Tour de France winner.
“When you read about the people and the problems we have here, maybe, you know, I associated it also with Ireland, between the north and south. We also have problems, but sport is a very, very good way of forgetting about the problems, to uniting people. So for me it's important to come here and just do my little piece to maybe make people smile. East, west, north, south, and just come together for one sporting event,” Roche added.
Sunday's race was loaded with symbolism, the 150-kilometre (93 miles) course crossing the former frontline during Bosnia's 1992-95 war.
The war ended in a peace deal that split power along ethnic lines, and the capital remains divided, between the country's two autonomous regions created with the war's end.
Part of the official schedule of the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI), the Sarajevo race brought together 120 cyclists from 20 countries, escorted by thousands of local cyclists including children dressed in yellow jerseys of the Tour de France.
“The only thing that makes (it so that) there was no Tour de France is world war, World War I, World War II. That's the only thing. So, when the Tour happens, that means it's peace and it's good for everybody,” said Christian Prudhomme, director of the Tour de France.
Sunday's race is the only event marking the start of the Great War to be jointly organized by Bosnia's two ethnic-based regions.
Serbs are refusing to take part in the main commemoration in Sarajevo, saying that it is designed to paint them as aggressors.
REUTERS