Turkey had used its influence to affect the general election in Bosnia and Bosnia's Islamic Community told Bosniaks to vote for Zeljko Komsic for Bosnia’s Croat member of Presidency, the Croatian member of the European Parliament Zeljana Zovko said during the Wednesday discussion in the EU Parliament on Bosnia.

The European Parliament's Committee on Foreign Affairs held a session, Thursday, where they discussed the post-election situation in Bosnia and amendments to EU Parliaments annual report on Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Zeljana Zovko spoke of Democratic Front (DF) Zeljko Komsic’s election for the Croat member of Bosnia’s tripartite Presidency who won over his biggest rival and leader of the nationalist Croat Democratic Union (HDZ BiH) Dragan Covic. She said she there were alleged controversies in the election process which were never mentioned before.

According to her, after the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan held an election rally in Bosnia, earlier this year, Turkey used its influence to affect the general election and that the Islamic Community in Bosnia suggested to Bosniaks to vote for Zeljko Komsic, thus securing his victory over the outnumbered Croat representative, Dragan Covic.

Adviser to the Head of Bosnia’s Islamic Community, Muhamed Jusic said for N1 that they reject these claims as an attempt of a malicious campaign against the Islamic Community.

“This is just a continuation of a malicious campaign against the Islamic Community led by some political centres from Croatia but also from Bosnia. They keep accusing us without any evidence of their claims,” Jusic said.

He added that such statements only hinder the reconciliation process and have far-reaching consequences.

In his opinion, the ultimate goal of such statements is to damage the interreligious relations in Bosnia and to transfer the conflict between political elites to the society in Bosnia.