Emigration of people from this region has been repeating in cycles over the past 100 years and these movements included Croat people too, said Croat member of Bosnia's tripartite Presidency Dragan Covic.

Speaking at the “Croats of Bosnia and Herzegovina – demographic reality” conference in Mostar on Monday, Covic said that some based their policies on inciting the emigrations from this region.

According to him, regardless of the official results of the 2013 population census, there is an assessments that the population of Bosnia and Herzegovina is less than three million, which leads to the question “how do we stand today and do the other propositions of the 2013 census, according to which Croats make 15.4 percent of population, remain.”

Bosnia and Herzegovina held a population census in 2013, the first one after declaring its independence in 1992. Official results published in 2016 said that Bosnia had nearly 3.8 million citizens, about 1.8 million Bosniaks, more than one million Serbs and 544,780 Croats. Compared to the 1991 population census results, the number of each of the three ethnic groups significantly decreased, mostly during the 1992-95 armed conflict but also in the years to come, due to the bad economic situation.

Covic expressed concern over, as he said, a complete change in the population structure on the largest part of Bosnia's territory during the 1996-2013 period.

Military Ordinary of Bosnia and Herzegovina Tomo Vuksic claimed that each of the three peoples was hit by the same problem and that their numbers were declining. According to him, this is directly related to the need of the western countries for import of labour force and everything else they lack.

The conference is held under auspices of the Croat member of Bosnia's Presidency.