Dubrovnik's Bombed-Out Heritage

On December 6th last year the city of Dubrovnik, a town whose days as an active participant in Western affairs had ended, with tourism now as its major industry, was rudely awakened by a five-hour artillery and mortar bombardment by federal Serbian troops which placed it, temporarily, hack at the centre of political events in southern Europe.

While the civil war in what was Yugoslavia has moved on, the consequences of that day in December, and the subsequent months of shelling, have provoked a vigorous response by Croatians, both in the region and in the UK, determined to help repair the appalling damage done to this historically important city and its bomb-blasted heritage.

One of these initiatives was the setting up of a charity, the International Monuments Trust – Croatia Appeal, by Lady Jadranka Beresford-Peirse, under the wing of the UK section of the UN-recognised International Council on Monuments and Historic Sites. Its latest initiative to raise funds to repair damage to Croatia's cultural heritage is a piano recital in November at the Royal Festival Hall in London by Ivo Pogorelic. All proceeds will be donated to the charity's Dubrovnik appeal.