headland

Nine Bosnian officials have been indicted for illegally allowing hundreds of foreign Islamic fighters to gain Bosnian citizenship after the 1992-95 war. According to the police officials who announced the charges in Sarajevo on Wednesday, the abuses of power occurred between 1995 and 1997, when fighters of African and Asian origin, who had fought with local Muslim troops against Serb and Croat forces, were illegally allowed to become Bosnian citizens. The names and positions of the officials charged were not released.

Robert Cvrtak, spokesperson for the Federation Police Administration, signaled that more indictments are in the offing. "The case," Cvrtak declared, "is part of a wider probe into the naturalization of 741 Arabs who obtained Bosnian citizenship illegally." Report of the announcement appeared on the web site of the Bosnian news agency ONASA, and was translated into English by the BBC Monitoring International Reports ("Bosnian Officials Indicted for Granting Citizenship to Foreign Islamic Fighters," November 25, 2004). According to an official source, Bosnian prosecutors are preparing indictments against 100 of the foreigners whose Bosnian citizenships are expected to be revoked. The mujahideen who entered Bosnia during the war against the Serbs and Croats were required to leave the country under the Dayton peace agreement, yet many are known to have remained.

Related headland stories:

• "Khalid Sheikh Mohammed Linked to Bosnian Islamists" (November 24, 2004) [Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the reported "mastermind" of the 9/11 attacks, obtained a Bosnian citizenship certificate in 1994 and a Bosnian passport soon thereafter.]
• "Bodansky: Al-Qaeda-Linked Terrorists Active in Bosnia" (October 28, 2004) [Yossef Bodansky, a noted terrorism expert, told the Serbian daily Glas Srpske that a terrorist network, answering to Osama bin Laden, is active in Bosnia-Hercegovina.]

Labels: al Qaeda, Al-Qa'idah, Al-Qaeda, Al-Qaida, Bosnia, Croatia, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Serbia, Yossef Bodansky