Winter Olympics: Silence for Sarajevo as Games open

King Harald of Norway opened the Lillehammer Games yesterday in a pageant chronicling his people's age-old battle with cold weather. Reindeer pulled sleighs, indigenous Sami (Lapps) sang pagan hymns, and two parachutists waving a Norwegian flag fell from a freezing but cloudless sky. Thoughts were also turned to the 1984 host city, Sarajevo, as the International Olympic Committee's president, Juan Antonio Samaranch, asked for a moment's silence. Bakim Babic, a 19-year-old cross-country skier from Sarajevo, entered the Olympic arena carrying the flag of Bosnia-Herzegovina at half-mast. In early ice hockey competition, Finland cruised to a 3-1 victory over the Czech Republic and Russia opened their campaign with an unconvincing 5-1 win over Norway.