O'Dea tours U2 Sarajevo concert site

The Minister for Defence Willie O’Dea will visit the stadium in Sarajevo today where U2 staged a symbolic concert after the Bosnian War ended.

Mr O’Dea, who is on an official visit to the Balkan region, will also tour sites of some of the worst atrocities of the 1992-1995 conflict.

U2, which released a single titled Miss Sarajevo, staged the first rock concert after the bitter three-year war ended.

The 'Popmart Tour' gig in the Kosevo Stadium offered a symbol of hope to thousands of war-scarred music fans who attended it in September 1997.

Mr O’Dea will also visit the Tito Monument in Sarajevo which overlooks local cemeteries where victims of the war are buried.

Afterwards the minister will tour a once-secret tunnel used to ferry supplies to Sarajevo residents during the siege by Serbian-backed forces.

Many public buildings in the city are still marked with bullet holes or scorched by shell attacks.

A total of 44 Irish personnel serving as part of the EU-led Eufor mission in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Ireland has participated in the operation since 1997.

More than 100,000 people were killed in Bosnia during the Balkans War in the 1990s following the break-up of the former Yugoslavia.

Bosnia-Herzegovina, which has a population of about four million people, is currently bidding to become a member of the EU.