Helez: I will not remain silent while they draw new borders before the eyes of the world!

(Patria) - Minister of Defence of BiH Zukan Helez (SDP) commented on reactions to his statement in which he called Željan Zovko and Croatian lobbyist Max Primorac Ustasha bastards and half-retarded.

He reacted strongly after they, at a session in the US Congress, accused Bosniaks of persecuting Catholic Croats in BiH, for which they advocated the formation of a third entity.

Helez says he will not fall silent. Here is his reaction:

"Recently, we have witnessed a veritable race of insults and attacks against me, coming precisely from those political actors who would most like to see Bosnia and Herzegovina divided, weakened, and without institutional strength.

However, despite the noise they create, none of them has offered a single concrete denial, nor an argument that would refute any fact I have publicly stated. They do not answer the questions that affect them most, because they know well that I am telling the truth.

They would like us to remain silent while they, openly and before the eyes of the entire world, draw new borders across the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina. There is no force that will make me fall silent when I see that an attack on the constitutional order and sovereignty of our state is being attempted through political means, in the same way that military means failed twice in the previous 80 years.

History has taught us at a high cost that ignoring open threats leads to tragedy. That is why I will always react - clearly, loudly, and without restraint. This is not a matter of political sympathies, but of an obligation to the state and to every one of its citizens.

My duty is to prevent any repetition of scenarios in which destructive and criminal policies, through attacks on the integrity of Bosnia and Herzegovina, produced genocide, mass suffering, camps, and mass graves. I will not allow this to happen again to Bosniaks, nor to any other people living in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Attacks on me will not change the facts. And the fact is one: those who shout the loudest do so only because the truth I speak hurts them the most. I will not remain silent, and no one will silence me."