Friar Ivo Markovic told N1 that one “hostile charge” from the war was systematically being kept in Bosnia and people were moving out because “they cannot live with Muslims”. However, he added, Bosnian Muslims were European Muslims, holding European values, and they could be a bridge towards the Islamic world.

According to Markovic, leader of the Croat Democratic Union (HDZ BiH) Dragan Covic was doing this in a very skilful manner. “…manipulation with that political Christianity, and he is using that populism successfully in cooperation with (Serbia's President) Vucic. Croatia's policy is playing a very bad role, they are simply Covic's marionettes”. 

In his opinion, there was a goal of establishing a Croat republic, dividing Bosnia as much as possible. Also, he pointed at a broader context towards the Islamic world.  

“There is a realistic danger of Islamism, Islamic fundamentalism. That is a huge problem of the modern world, and it is partly present in Bosnia. However, Bosnian Muslims are European Muslims holding European values, who could be a bridge towards the Islamic world. It never cease to amaze me why Croatia's policy doesn't use Bosnian Muslims to make that bridge, to integrate those people more, instead of excluding them,” said Markovic.  

He emphasized he could not rule out the culpability of Bosniak policy too, adding that there was Islamic, fundamentalist faction within the Party of Democratic Action (SDA) who would like to make Sarajevo a city without Croats. According to Markovic, it was Boosniaks’ task to unmask this faction.  

Markovic concluded by saying that Bosnia was a model of Europe.  

“We have fantastic mechanisms of coexistence, and in that sense we could be a model of Europe. The war was an attempt to kill that model. The greater-Serbia policy has remained in power in Serbia. Vucic is a Chetnik and one has to openly say that. Honestly speaking, the war we had was a war to Christianity against Islam. Chetniks and Croat side were in war, but they coordinated relations in the war against Islamic world,” stressed Markovic, adding that there was attempt to keep this alive.  

Ivo Markovic is also a professor at the Sarajevo Faculty of Franciscan Theology.