Most Mehmed-paše Sokolovića

This 180 m-long bridge (Most Mehmed-Paše Sokolovića/Мост Мехмед-Паше Соколовића) has spanned the Drina since 1577. Located in the center of Višegrad and listed as a Unesco World Heritage site in 2007, it was designed by the famous Ottoman architect Mimar Sinan for the Bosnian-born grand vizier Mehmed Pacha Sokolović. A source of inspiration for Ivo Andrić's novel The Bridge over the Drina (1945), the structure was also the site of terrible massacres. Alas, this is not mentioned either by Unesco or by the explanatory panels on site. The bridge has also lost most of its original stonework. In 1915, two of its eleven piers were dynamited by the Serbian army fleeing from Austro-Hungarian troops. It remained gutted for twenty-five years. In October 1943, more than 2,000 Bosnian inhabitants were massacred by Serbian Chetniks. Half the bridge was then destroyed to cut off the road to the Nazis and Croatian Ustachis. Rebuilt in 1952, the bridge remains fragile. But cars and trucks continued to pass over it until a road bridge was built downstream in 1987. Five years later, reinforcement work was interrupted by the war. From June to October 1992, the old bridge was once again used by Serb nationalists as an execution site. Around 3,000 civilians, mostly Bosnians, were killed here and in the surrounding area. Corpses thrown into the Drina continue to resurface. This hasn't stopped the town hall from organizing a diving competition on the bridge in July, since 2007.