Italy investigates trip to shoot civilians in Sarajevo

The Milan public prosecutor’s office has opened an investigation into allegations that the Italian nationals took part in a type of “human safari” in which tourists were taken and civilians shot dead during the brutal Bosnian Serb siege of Sarajevo (now Bosnia and Herzegovina) in the 1990s.

The investigation began with a complaint filed by author Ezio Gavazzeni, who compiled material on the case from information passed to him by a former Bosnian intelligence officer.

“Information received from sources in Bosnia and Herzegovina is that Bosnian intelligence has alerted the local headquarters of Sismi (Italian Military Intelligence and Security Service) about the presence of at least five Italian nationals who accompanied them to shoot civilians in the hilly areas surrounding the city of Sarajevo,” Gavazzeni sent to Milan MPs on January 28, 2025.

The author cites a 2024 email exchange in which a former secret agent reported learning about the “Human Safari” in late 1993 after interrogating a Serb volunteer captured by the Bosnian army.

The prisoner would have testified that five foreign nationals, including at least three Italians, accompanied him from Belgrade, the capital of present-day Serbia, to Sarajevo, the capital of present-day Bosnia and Herzegovina. At the time, Sarajevo was the target of one of the most brutal sieges in modern history by Serbian forces seeking to prevent the dissolution of the former Yugoslavia.

The group of “tourist gunmen” is believed to have started from Trieste, an Italian city on the border with Slovenia, and is believed to have included financially well-off men, including the owner of a plastic surgery clinic in Milan.

According to the indictment, the “hunters” were paid a fee for each civilian they killed. “Children were more expensive, then men (even more expensive if they were in uniform or armed), women, and finally elderly people who could be killed for free.”

Gavazzeni also said he had access to classified footage from director Milan Zupanic’s 2022 documentary “Sarajevo Safari,” and said in an anonymous statement that “Americans, Canadians, Russians and Italians are also willing to go to war.”

According to a former Bosnian intelligence officer I interviewed, the clients were “very wealthy people” who could afford “these adrenaline-pumping challenges” and had ties to far-right groups. The former spy also believes Bosnian Serb security officials were behind the plot.

He also reported that Mr. Sismi, now with the Italian Intelligence and Internal Security Agency (Aisi), managed to prevent such travel after being warned. “Dear Ezio, the Bosnian service learned about the safari at the end of 1993. We informed Sismi at the beginning of 1994, and within a few months they responded: “We found out that the safari would leave from Trieste and we suspended it. The safari will no longer take place,” the former agent told the writer.

However, Bosnian services never discovered details about who organized and participated in this plan.

Milan MPs are investigating the hypothesis of multiple aggravated murders for tragic reasons and brutality and will request the file from Mr. Aisi in this case, as well as requesting action from the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. He is not yet on the list of suspects under investigation.

The Serbian siege of Sarajevo lasted almost four years and left more than 10,000 people dead. Snipers used to hide in the mountains surrounding the city and shoot indiscriminately at people on the streets, especially civilians, who accounted for more than 80% of the victims.