The US State Department said on Monday that it has banned Bosnian Serb lawmaker Nikola Spiric and members of his immediate family from entering the US over Spiric's alleged "involvement in significant corruption."

Spiric is the Vice-President of the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats (SNSD), the party in power in Bosnia’s Serb-dominated semi-autonomous Republika Srpska (RS) entity, and a lawmaker in the House of Representatives.  

Spiric was sanctioned under Section 7031(c) of the Department of State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Act of 2018, which says that, should the US Secretary of State have credible information that foreign officials were involved in ‘significant corruption or gross violations of human rights, those individuals and their immediate family members are ineligible for entry into the United States.’  

‘Mr. Spiric engaged in and benefited from public corruption, including the acceptance of improper benefits in exchange for the performance of public functions and interference with public processes, during his tenure as a member of the House of Representatives in Bosnia and Herzegovina,’ the US Statedepartment said.  

Spiric’s wife, Nada Spiric, his son, Aleksandar Spiric, and his daughter, Jovana Spiric, were also placed under the sanctions.  

‘I hear this for the first time. Until I read the decision, I have no comment,’ Spiric told N1 in a short phone conversation.