Sarajevo Roses

Anne Marie du Preez Bezdrob was born and raised in Johannesburg. She is the author of Sarajevo Roses: War memoir of a Peacekeeper, based on her two years working as a UN peacekeeper in Bosnia. Anne, a journalist and author of The Nelson Mandela Story, and Winnie Mandela ­ A Life, returned to South Africa in 1995 and now lives in Kestell in the eastern Free State. While living in Namibia, she started working for the UN, and landed up in Bosnia where she started a radio station that kept locals informed of the UN presence in their country. She soon became involved in local culture and as a go-between in Serb-Bosnian POW exchanges. She helped set up the exhibition of Sarajevo art, Witness, in New York, and also got the Sarajevo Philharmonic Orchestra to play at a concert in Italy. The grandmother of three was previously married to journalist Max du Preez. While living in Bosnia she met Armin Bezrob.