Invented by the Croats and put into practice by the Serbs, the “Yugoslav” ideal finally to be dying. A few decades of cohabitation were insufficient to bury the hatchet of an almost thousand year-old antagonism that this ill-fated union brought to the surface. Paradoxically, despite being much desired, it was precarious from the outset. Only the iron rule of communism held it together artificially. Today's war in Bosnia-Herzegovina, which has acquired religious implications with the resurgence of anti-islamic feeding in the Balkans, is the latest chapter in the history of the now twice defunct federation of “southern Slav states”.Inventado por los croatas e impuesto por los serbios, el ideal “yugoslavo” parece agonizar definitivamente. Unos cuantos decenios de convivencia no bastaron para eliminar los antagonismos casi milenarios que condicionaron que esta desventurada unión, paradójicamente tan largamente anhelada, resultara precaria desde su inicio. Sólo el autoritarismo comunista logró mantenerla artificialmente cohesionada. El actual conflicto en Bosnia-Herzegobina, que ha adquirido ya ribetes de una guerra de religión ante el resurgimiento del sentimiento anti islámico en los Balcanes, representa la última escena del drama de la ahora dos veces extinta federación de los “esclavos del sur”.

Universidad del Pacífico