Bosnia’s Presidency Chairman, Sefik Dzaferovic, strongly criticised Croatia’s President, Zoran Milanovic, for his statements on BiH at the NATO summit in Madrid, saying that Milanovic’s attempts to connect BiH’s electoral reform with the issue of Finland’s NATO accession failed.

Dzaferovic made the statement after Milanovic dedicated a significant part of his statements in Madrid to electoral reform in Bosnia and Herzegovina and said that this is a security issue in the region.

Dzaferovic welcomed the messages of support for BiH from the NATO Summit, saying the alliance clearly showed awareness that BiH is exposed to risks and that it is committed to supporting the country in strengthening resilience, integrity and political independence.

“The war in Ukraine should be a lesson in what can happen in BiH if the spread of malignant Russian influence is tolerated and if neighbouring countries think they can take over the right to BiH,” he said.

As for Milanovic, Dzaferovic said that the Croatian President is “obsessed” with interfering with the internal matters of BiH.

“It is evident that Milanovic is a parody of the dictator, who sees BiH as a kind of his Sudetenland or Donbas, unaware that the time has passed when the laws in BiH were decided in Zagreb. This was shown by the fiasco of his initiative by which he tried to connect Finland’s accession to NATO with the Election Law in BiH “, said Dzaferovic.

He argued that Milanovic is deliberately “distorting reality” regarding the rights of Croats in BiH.

“Croats in BiH are not a national minority, but a constituent people, who have a far greater influence on the decision-making of government institutions than any national minority in Croatia,” Dzaferovic stressed.