Bihać (Serbian-Cyrillic Бихаћ; German outdated Wihitsch, Wihitz or Wihatsch) is a city in the extreme northwest of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is located near the border with Croatia on the Una River and is the capital of the Una-Sana canton in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The municipality of Bihać, which in addition to the actual city also includes the surrounding area, has around 61,000 inhabitants. More than 90% of the population are Bosniaks.
Early history
The Unatal seems to have been particularly
important in prehistoric times. At Ripač, about 10 km southeast of
Bihać, extensive pile dwellings have been found, which began in the
Bronze Age. A little closer to Bihać, near Jezerine, a large
cemetery from the La Tène period with numerous urns and valuable
grave goods was discovered, and another in Ribić, a suburb of Bihać.
Until 1918
The city was first mentioned in a document from
King Béla IV in 1260, where it is referred to as the property of the
Cistercian monastery of Topusko. The city was called Castrum
bichiciense in Latin documents and Wihitsch in German. In the Middle
Ages, Bihać was temporarily the seat of the Croatian-Hungarian
kings. King Béla IV had the city surrounded with a wall in the 13th
century, which is where the ring road now runs. From the 13th to the
16th centuries, the Croatian Sabor met several times in Bihać. In
1592 the city was conquered by the Ottomans and became part of the
Paschaliks Bosnia, whose history it has shared since then. As an
Ottoman fortress near the border with the Austrian military border,
Bihać was besieged more than 63 times by the Austrian armies during
the Turkish wars, but was never captured. Bihać was then considered
impregnable due to its high and strong walls.
As a result of
the Berlin Treaty in 1878, the city, which was predominantly
inhabited by Muslims, came under the administration of
Austria-Hungary together with Bosnia-Herzegovina. But it was not
until September 1878 that Bihać was captured by Austro-Hungarian
troops under General Reinländer against fierce resistance. From 1888
the fortification walls were dismantled with the exception of a few
remains.
1918 to 1990
After the end of the First World War
and the subsequent collapse of Austria-Hungary, the city belonged to
the newly founded Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, which was
renamed the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in 1929. Here Bihać became a
district town in the Vrbas Banschaft. During the Second World War,
Bihać was attacked by German troops on April 13, 1941 and then
became part of the vassal state Independent State of Croatia, which
was allied with National Socialist Germany. A memorial park designed
by Bogdan Bogdanović was inaugurated in Garavice in 1981 for the
victims of a massacre committed by the Ustaše in 1941.
Just a
few days after the attack, resistance to the occupation formed in
the city and its surroundings, which culminated in April 1942 with
the partisans taking over the city and the proclamation of the Bihać
Republic. On November 26 and 27, 1942, the first meeting of the
Anti-Fascist Council for National Liberation of Yugoslavia (AVNOJ)
took place here, which formed the basis for the later Yugoslav
government under Tito. On January 29, 1943, the German troops
succeeded in retaking the city. It remained under German occupation
until it was liberated by the Yugoslav People's Liberation Army on
March 28, 1945.
During the time of socialist Yugoslavia,
Bihać belonged as a district town to the Socialist Republic of
Bosnia and Herzegovina, which was newly formed within Yugoslavia,
and developed into the economic and administrative center in
northwestern Bosnia.
Since 1990
During the Bosnian War,
the area around Bihać formed from 1992 to 1995 an enclave surrounded
by Serb militias from the Republika Srpska on the one hand and the
Republic of Serbian Krajina on the other, which was under the
control of Bosnian government troops for the entire length of the
war UN protection zone was declared. At times, those responsible
around Fikret Abdić from the area north of the city agreed a
separate peace with the besiegers. However, this was rejected by the
leadership of the Bosnian army corps in Bihać, which temporarily led
to fighting between Bosniak-dominated troops. In the summer of 1995,
the situation in the Bihać enclave worsened dramatically. According
to estimates by the UN at the time, around 150,000 refugees crowded
the enclave, which was now increasingly under Serbian artillery fire
and into which the Serbs were pushing their positions. International
observers also anticipated a humanitarian catastrophe for Bihać as
early as July 1995.
On August 4, 1995, the Croatian army began a large-scale military
offensive, Military Operation Oluja, with the recapture of the
Serb-occupied territories in Croatia. This operation lasted four
days; the entire Republic of Serbian Krajina was reintegrated into
Croatian territory. The impending danger for the previous enclave of
Bihać was averted at the last minute by this Croatian offensive. At
the same time, probably in a coordinated military operation,
Croatian and Bosnian units also fought successfully in western
Bosnia against the Serbian units, which saw themselves increasingly
on the defensive. In a few weeks the whole of western Bosnia was
again in the hands of the Bosnian-Croatian Federation, and the
Bosnian heartland could henceforth be reconnected with the Bihać
area.
On July 24, 2014, Bihać was granted city status
(degree) by the parliament of the Federation of Bosnia and
Herzegovina.
Since the refugee crisis in Europe from 2015,
Bihać has been used by migrants as a place to stay before crossing
the border into the European Union. In the summer of 2019, reports
of inhumane conditions in the Vučjak refugee camp located in the
municipality attracted more media attention. According to
eyewitnesses, there was no electricity, hardly enough food and no
sanitary facilities. Almost all residents suffered from scabies and
were otherwise ill. In November 2019, the regional government of the
canton of Una-Sana imposed a curfew on Vučjak and another camp near
Bihac after more crimes were recorded in the region and local
residents protested. According to the Bosnian media, refugees mainly
broke into houses and stole food and cars. There had also been
violent conflicts among the refugees. After around 500 of the 600
migrants or residents in the camp went on a hunger strike on
December 5th, Bosnia dissolved the refugee camp on December 10th.
The 600 residents were taken to a former barracks.