„People lived for eight years not knowing if they would even return home when they left the house in the morning,“ he says. „People saw babies massacred and whole village wiped out. Today there are cases of schizophrenia relating to those years. It was horrible, and after a while, no one knew who was killing who anymore.“

The civil war began after an era of unprecedented openness in the late 1980s. Personal freedoms blossomed and dozens of new political parties were created. But when Islamist parties appeared ready to sweep to victory in the early 90s, the government canceled legislative elections.