Secretary of State, Michael Pompeo, and the US State Department have the information that Bosnian Serb MP, Nikola Spiric, was involved in public corruption, the US Embassy to Bosnia and Herzegovina told N1.

“Given the circumstances of this specific case, we believe it is important for the authorities and the public of Bosnia and Herzegovina to be informed about how seriously the United States of America take the problem of public corruption and the involvement of Mr Spiric in the corruption activities,” the Embassy said.

The US State Department said on Monday that it has banned Spiric and members of his immediate family from entering the US, over Spiric's alleged “involvement in significant corruption.”

Spiric, who is a senior official of the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats (SNSD), the ruling party in Bosnia's Serb-dominated entity Republika Srpska (RS), assessed the sanctions as “a product of the frustration of the outgoing US Ambassador Maureen Cormack.”

SNSD leader and President of the RS entity, Milorad Dodik, who was put on the US blacklist last year for obstructing the implementation of the Dayton Peace Accords which ended the 1992-95 Bosnian war, also reacted.

He said the Ambassador was “flagrantly meddling with political processes and election in Bosnia.”

The Embassy clarified in its statement that the decision was based on the findings the US institutions had.

“US State Secretary Michael Pompeo and the US State Department have credible information that Mr. Nikola Spiric was 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 Embassy said.

Spiric's wife, son and daughter were also placed under the State Department's sanctions.