UEFA experts: Bosnia needs national strategy on safety in stadiums

EPA

The security situation at Bosnia's football stadiums is far from satisfying, according to Steve Frosdick, an expert on safety and security at sports events and representative of Europe's football top authority, the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA).

“Although your clubs play a very few games in the qualifiers for the Champions League and the Europa League, including the games of the national team outside Bosnia and Herzegovina, the facts are disappointing and you are amongst the most problematic ones in Europe,” said Frosdick, speaking at a two-day workshop held in Sarajevo under auspices of Bosnia's Football Association.

Of 55 UEFA members, Bosnia's football fans take 10th place in the use of the pyrotechnics at the internationally played games of Bosnia's clubs or its national team.

The situation is a little better with the international games at domestic stadiums, according to Fosdick, but far from the satisfying.

One of the conclusions of the workshop was that the “hooligan incidents” that Bosnia's fans make are at a lower level than those in neighbouring Croatia and Serbia.

UEFA's experts warned that there was no “safe” use of the pyrotechnics and that fans usually do not comprehend the risks of its use.

“The users of pyrotechnics, as well as so-called passive observers, may get epilepsy or asthma. Also, the pyrotechnics burns at temperatures of 1,000 to 1,500 degrees Celsius and when used it often results in the most severe burns. All pyrotechnics is considered explosive devices,” said UEFA's explosives consultant Tom Smith.

While awaiting its candidate status in the European Union, Bosnia will have to arrange many sectors. One of the accession conditions will be a national strategy on safety in stadiums, said Frosdick, adding that there has to exist a political will to have this strategy adopted.