Labour Party of Bosnia and Herzegovina Organises Birthday Celebration for Convicted War Criminal Fikret Abdić

The Labour Party of Bosnia and Herzegovina has invited members, sympathisers and citizens to join them on 3 October for the birthday celebration of convicted war criminal Fikret Abdić, at the Maljevac business centre in Croatia. Organised buses depart at 9 a.m. from several different locations in Velika Kladuša, reports the Patria news agency.

The Labour Party of Bosnia and Herzegovina was founded in December 2013, and its president is Fikret's daughter Elvira Abdić Jelenović, who also founded the party.

Fikret Abdić was released on parole from prison in Pula in March 2012, after serving two-thirds of his sentence, i.e. 10 years and 9 months, to which he was sentenced for war crimes committed in the Bosanska Krajina region from 1993 to 1995 and for the proclamation of the so-called Autonomous Province of Western Bosnia.

The County Court in Karlovac sentenced Abdić to 20 years in prison in 2003, and the Supreme Court commuted the sentence to 15 years.

He was tried as a citizen of Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, based on an indictment by the Prosecutor's Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and under an agreement between the two governments on legal assistance.

He was found guilty of establishing the so-called province of Western Bosnia, contrary to the Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and because, as the supreme commander of the so-called People's Defence, he was responsible for opening camps and reception centres through which at least 5,000 opponents of the establishment of that province passed.