Opposition parties in Republika Srpska (RS), Bosnia's Serb-dominated territorial entity, are criticizing RS President, Milorad Dodik, over a controversial statement he made in a local TV programme, saying the interests of the Croats in Bosnia are more important to him than the Serb victims of WWII.

Dodik's political ally and Croat member of Bosnia's tripartite Presidency, Dragan Covic, attended a ceremony to commemorate tens of thousands of Croatian civilians and soldiers of the defeated Nazi-allied Independent State of Croatia (NDH), in Bleiburg, southern Austria, earlier in May.

Many of the victims of the NDH regime were Serbs, who were sent to concentration camps like the one in Jasenovac.

When Milorad Dodik spoke in a local TV programme on Monday, he was asked about his future coalition partner's attendance at the Bleiburg event.

“Everyone has the right to commemorate their own victims,” Dodik said.

“I also go to places where Serbs perished,” he added.

The next day, Dodik spoke at the opening of the International Conference on Jasenovac in Banjaluka.

The President of one of the parties in opposition to Dodik's Alliance of Independent Social Democrats (SNSD), Vukota Govedarica, said the statement shows that Dodik cares more about Croat interests than about Serb WWII victims.

“Comparing Serb victims with Ustasha (Nazi-allied Croat soldiers during WWII) executioners does not help the RS President and should be condemned in every way,” Govedarica, from the Serb Democratic Party (SDS), said.

“I don't know how the RS President will explain himself to the families of all the massacred Serbs in Drakulic, Sargovac, Motike, all the Serbs that were massacres from 1941 to 1945 (…),” he said.

The Party of Democratic Progress (PDP) also criticised Dodik, saying that equalizing the Jasenovac and Bleiburg events is “humiliating for the Serb people”.