Opposing the construction of a bridge Croatia started building across Bosnian waters is part of Bosniak wartime efforts to turn the only Bosnian coastal town of Neum into a port, the Croat Democratic Union (HDZ) said in a press release.

The Peljesac Bridge is intended to link the Croatian mainland and the Peljesac Peninsula, bypassing a 15 kilometre-long strip around the city of Neum that represents Bosnia and Herzegovina’s only coast on the Adriatic Sea. The bridge would cut travel time between the Dubrovnik area and the rest of Croatia by circumventing customs and border controls around Neum.

Predominantly Bosniak political parties are against the construction of the Peljesac Bridge because they believe it might prevent large vessels from entering Bosnia's Bay of Neum, threatening Bosnia and Herzegovina's access to open sea.

They also claim that the border between the two countries in the bay remains undefined.

Bosnian media said that the Chairman of Bosnia’s tripartite Presidency, Bosniak member Bakir Izetbegovic, might resort to filing a lawsuit against Croatia with the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) in Hamburg. Izetbegovic said that Croatia has ignored all pleas coming from Bosnia requesting the construction be halted.

The HDZ, the main ethnic Croat political party in the country whose leader, Dragan Covic, is also a member of the tripartite state Presidency, said that there is an ongoing “political and media offensive of Bosniak representatives against the construction.”

The European Commission, which is financing the project, determined that “there are no open legal issues” standing in the way, the party said.

The HDZ said the bridge would help Bosnia by easing traffic through the Neum area, which is practically blocked by vehicles during the summer months every year.

It said that Bosnia would achieve significant economic gains due to the direct connection with Croatia’s south.

The opposition to the Bridge stems from a continuation of Bosniak wartime efforts, the party said. Bosniak intellectuals drafted a document in 1995, named ‘The Bosnian Coast and Neum’, which included their geopolitical assessment of the Neum area and a plan to build a large port there.

The efforts were led by academic Ibrahim Busatlija, the party alleged.

“Busatlija’s big dream back in 1995 foresaw Neum to be a strategic base of Bosnian goals and access to the sea as well as an attempt to directly influence that area through the construction of a large port,” the party said.

This would have changed the ethnic composition of the town of Neum and enabled Bosniaks to control the only Bosnian access to the sea, the statement said.

Right now, Bosnia’s only access to the sea is controlled by Croats. The HDZ said that Sarajevo is trying to take control of it and influence future projects.  

“Bosniak political representatives are clearly and unequivocally prepared to sacrifice strategic and infrastructural interests of the entire country for the sake of their own (ethnic and national) interests, presenting this as patriotism, although it is about the selfish wartime goals which the construction of the Peljesac bridge largely disrupts,” the HDZ said.