No Country for the Needy: Bosnia Fails to House its Displaced

On Easter Sunday 2010, Angelina Jolie came to the eastern Bosnian town of Rogatica and performed a miracle. The Hollywood star had been touring the country in her off-screen role as ambassador for the UN refugee agency, UNHCR. At a makeshift shelter in a former school building, she was introduced to Lena Babic, an elderly woman who had lost her home in the Bosnian war 18 years previously. The women communicated through an interpreter - Angelina speaking of her children, Lena of her long wait for a new home.

"I didn't realise she was a famous actress," Lena said, recalling the meeting. "It felt as though I had known her for ages." They shared coffee and cakes and, as it was Easter Sunday, cracked open some boiled, handpainted eggs - an Orthodox tradition celebrating the miracle of Christ's resurrection.

Soon, Lena's encounter with Angelina would provide further cause for celebration. Media coverage of their meeting highlighted the dire conditions at the shelter and prompted offers of foreign aid. Within two years, Lena and her neighbours had been re-housed in a new, purpose-built apartment block - an achievement that, in post-war Bosnia, counts as nothing short of miraculous.

Some 8,000 people who lost their homes in the Bosnian war are still waiting for miracles. They have spent 25 years in wretched conditions in so-called "collective centres" - wartime shelters that were meant to be temporary but that have, for want of alternatives, become permanent. Six years ago, European governments pledged a 60-million euro loan towards re-housing them, but barely any new homes have been built.

Last year, the political system responsible for this prolonged failure was ensnared in a humanitarian crisis - this time over housing migrants and refugees...