We try to ask the director of the international peace centre some critical questions. The man is very occupied and also director of the Sarajevo Winter Festival, which is going on at the very moment. A festival with artists from 35 countries, taking over a month. Upfront some-one told us that man speaks too much. A little too late we arrive at the office. Indeed that man is quite busy. It took 15 minutes before he found time to ask someone to bring some coffee and when this arrived, about ten minutes later, he left. Also the appointment one and a half hour later was invane. No Ibrahim Spahic around. From the brochures we get we filter the answers of our questions. Because of this reason we can not take any responsability concerning the (un)politeness of the words that are used.
History of the festival
The first time the festival was organized was in the beginning
of 1985, during the Olympic games that were 
held
in Sarajevo at that time. During 12 seasons and 600 festival days 1150
different performances and exhibitions were held which was visited by 2
million visitors and showed by 11.000 artists.
The festival was also organized during the siege of Sarajevo (in '92, '93, '94 and 1995). The Sarajevo winter festival, together with the international peace center organized the project 'Sarajevo, an open city'. The project Sarajevo, cultural city of Europe was supported by the EU, UNESCO, the European parliament, the Brussels region and Open Road Stockholm - Sarajevo. PTT BiH is general sponsor of the Sarajevo winter festival.
How is the current festival, is it a succes?
And if so, in what sense is it a succes?
Unfortunately no answer.
Could you tell us a little about the international peace center.
No answer
Can you tell us about the relation between the festival and the peace centre.
By organizing this festival we call upon the world to decide about freedom and peace. In that way the Sarajevo Winter festival proves not to be mare a festival, but live itself. The international Peace center is promotor of the sarajevo winter festival.
What is your opinion about the efforts of that political involvement.
Mister Ibrahim Spahic runs out to answer another telephonecall. On the telephone he answerd some-one that the black shep is the festivals mascotte
The title of the current festival is; citizens of a metropolis. We will have an international meeting in Holland comming up on the first of Mai. This seminar will have the subject 'Global Village'. A question will be; are the villages going to be connected with the global town or are the citizens of the towns in the world going to be more isolated and therefor become more like villagers. Could you give us your thought about the global Village?
Even his friend, the bosnian ambassador in Sweden, present at this meeting, hears our question but has no time to answer.
We'll get back to this.
Finally we will have a look for ourselves, of course. Figuraly zenith for me was the concert of the Willem Breuker Collectief. Many dutch people in the hall but also they were surprised again and a again. How beautifull if you don't need words to make people laugh endlessly. I invited some Bosnian people o fwhich I really thought they had to go and see this. At the end of the concert I was still in the sphere of the music and forgot all about the fact I was in Bosnia, or where-ever, Pardoes_. I started to speak dutch and asked my friends if they understood the Dutch freedom. As it seems everything was clear. They all responded in Dutch: Lekker, Lekker.
Sarajevo Winter Festival
The International Peace center
Ibrahim Spahic