Radončić: Lavrov's anti-Muslim statement

Fahrudin Radončić, SBB leader and former BiH security minister, reacted after a statement by Sergey Lavrov, Russia's foreign minister, that Russia was checking information on mercenaries from BiH, Kosovo and Albania who were allegedly in Donbas.

- As a former Minister of Security of Bosnia and Herzegovina, who was elected to this responsible position twice, and a man who was the first in the region to initiate amendments to the criminal law sanctioning the departure of its citizens to foreign battlefields or organizing and financing such illegal missions, I have to react to, in essence, the anti-Muslim statement of the Russian Foreign Minister.

Therefore, we need to check the facts regarding the statement of Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov that mercenaries from BiH, Albania and Kosovo are at war in Ukraine, regardless of the fact that such a statement by Lavrov in the context of the current crisis in NATO-Russia relations can be seen as part of Russia's propaganda strategy to present Muslims from the Balkans as a security threat in the heart of Europe.

Thanks to the amendments to the Criminal Code, BiH citizens who possibly go to foreign battlefields know that they will be sanctioned upon their return to the country, so I believe that there are not many hotheads who are ready to risk imprisonment for going to Ukraine or another country.

Let me remind you that Bosnia and Herzegovina, ie its independent judiciary (supported by facts obtained from domestic and foreign intelligence and competent police agencies), has already sentenced a significant number of returnees from the Syrian and other battlefields to many years in prison.

Thus, we have shown that our country is a serious member of the anti-terrorist alliance and a reliable partner in the fight against paramilitary formations.

That is exactly why Mr. Lavrov's statements are politicized and tendentious, with the goal of diverting attention from the essence and goals of the aggression that his government is preparing towards the sovereign state of Ukraine - said Radončić.