‘Punk was my weapon’: the rebel power of culture in siege of Sarajevo

The film culminates in a 1997 concert held by U2, after the group was lobbied during the siege by US aid worker Bill Carter. Photograph: Damir Šagolj/Reuters

As a radio operator during the siege of Sarajevo, Boris Siber made use of music to blast the enemy airwaves and destroy their communication. “The Clash, Jimi Hendrix and the Sex Pistols, as loud as possible on the frequencies they were using … they changed frequency, then I found them again. That was my task.”

Siber – a member of a hit Yugoslav comedy troupe before the war forced its breakup – also kept up civilian and military morale as a radio comic. “Music and mic were my weapons.”