Bakir Izetbegović Labels Czech President's Statements as Xenophobic and Islamophobic

Member of the BiH Presidency Bakir Izetbegović has completely rejected the statement by Czech President Miloš Zeman that, due to its national composition, BiH could become a base for ISIL, reports the Patria agency.

Izetbegović stated that the statement is not based on facts and is far from the real state of affairs. The facts are as follows:

- From 2012 until today, a total of 240 BiH citizens have been present on the Syrian-Iraqi battlefield. Of these, 54 lived in the diaspora before leaving for the aforementioned battlefield, mostly in Western European countries, and most of all in Austria. Currently, 116 BiH citizens are on the Syrian-Iraqi battlefield. Of the total of 55 BiH citizens who have returned from the said battlefields, 44 are in BiH, ten in Western European countries, and one in a prison in Turkey. Of the 44 returnees, 23 have been finally convicted. Bearing in mind the aforementioned facts, it is clear that there are no real assumptions that BiH could become a base for ISIL, as Zeman insinuates.

Similar to earlier statements by Croatian President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović and Austrian Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz, Zeman, without any cause or basis, spreads dangerous untruths about the state of BiH and especially about Bosniaks, Muslims. The intention of these statements is to poison the European public with a false representation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, especially of its citizens of the Islamic faith, as an alleged security threat to Europe.

It is obvious that this is a xenophobic and Islamophobic campaign by certain officials of some Central European countries. This reminds us of some similar statements from the end of the last century, by which some in Europe justified the absence of intervention that would have prevented the genocide against Bosniaks and the attempt to destroy Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Bosniaks, as a European people, will never renounce the achieved civilizational values they cherish, nor their tradition and faith. It is precisely our tradition and faith that have taught us to be tolerant. Even when we were barbarically killed, even when we experienced genocide, we did not resort to revenge or extremism, but persisted in civilizational values, truth and justice.

All institutions of Bosnia and Herzegovina have resolutely opposed violent extremism and terrorism and in that fight cooperate very successfully with their international partners. BiH, as a member of the Coalition against ISIL, has made very concrete contributions. BiH is the first country in the region to declare the participation of its citizens in foreign paramilitary formations and organizations a criminal offense. This has resulted in no recorded departures to foreign battlefields in 2016.

Particularly vocal and concrete in condemning all forms of terrorism and violent extremism were precisely the Bosniaks. Bosniak political, intellectual and religious leaders clearly distanced themselves from extremist ideologies and condemned radicalism and terrorism in the Joint Statement on Condemnation of Terrorism and Violent Extremism of December 4, 2015. Also, the Islamic Community of BiH has institutionally opposed the phenomena of extremism and parallel congregations that tried to work outside its framework and outside its constitution and interpretation of Islam.

Therefore, instead of baselessly accusing BiH and Bosniaks, it would be more useful for European xenophobes and Islamophobes to look into their own backyards, where neo-Nazism and various anti-civilizational ideologies flourish, and to ask themselves what they are doing to oppose these retrograde phenomena - said Bakir Izetbegović.