Original version

BBC World Service Online

From Our Own Correspondent

News

Insight, wit and analysis from BBC correspondents, journalists and writers.

Insight, wit and analysis from BBC correspondents, journalists and writers from around the world.

From Our Own Correspondent: Bosnia and Sri Lanka

Bosnia and Sri Lanka

BBC World Service - From Our Own Correspondent, Bosnia and Sri Lanka

Alan Johnston presents the stories behind the headlines from BBC correspondents worldwide

Alan Johnston with despatches from BBC correspondents around the world. Today, Nick Thorpe finds memories of Gen Mladic in Bosnia and Peter Meanwell hears the songs of Sri Lanka's bereaved women.

Alan Johnston introduces insight, wit and analysis from BBC correspondents around the world. In this edition, Nick Thorpe on the enduring support General Mladic still commands among some Serbs, and Peter Meanwell on the Sri Lanka's music of mourning.

Memories of Mladic

Every prisoner spends his first days in jail trying to adapt to the rhythm of the place - the guards, the sounds, the food and so on. The former Bosnian Serb army commander, Radko Mladic must surely be going through that process now, in his first days in his cell in the Hague. He'll soon face trial there on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity. 

Nick Thorpe has been retracing General Mladic's past, and spending time in the village where he grew up in Bosnia - where there are some who still support him.

Songs of grief

It's now two years since the Sri Lankan government declared victory over the Tamil Tiger guerrillas. What remained of the rebel forces had been crushed in one last, terrible battle. 

Throughout the long conflict, the north of the island was the scene of the vast majority of the violence. But the ending of the war has given way to something much less than complete peace and calm - as Peter Meanwell found out on a recent trip to record the songs of the region.

Accessibility links

Programme Index

From Our Own Correspondent

Bosnia and Sri Lanka

Genres

Brand

BBC World Service Online

About BBC World Service