The leader of the Democratic Action Party (SDA), Bakir Izetbegovic, called in an interview with Al Arabiya for a stronger involvement of Islamic countries in BiH in order to overcome the West led by the USA, accusing it of working in the interests of Croats and Serbs.

“The West is helping to resolve things by agreement and compromise, to our detriment. That is why a stronger influence of Islamic countries is needed to create a balance. Islamic countries should stand by us more strongly. They should show more concern,” Izetbegovic told the international Arab news television channel financed by Saudi Arabia.

He added that the political situation today is similar to that during the war when the West imposed an arms embargo on Bosnia and Herzegovina, which made Bosniaks unable to defend themselves.

The SDA leader called out the US administration for the latest developments, stressing that the US favours the Serbian side because of the war in Ukraine.

“The USA wants to stabilise relations in the Balkans by favouring the strong at the expense of the smaller nations. It is making concessions to Serbia in order to pull it away from Russia and Putin,” Izetbegovic pointed out.

After the last elections, Izetbegovic's party was removed from power at the state level and at the entity level of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Its positions were taken over by a bloc of Bosniak and civic parties that are in coalition with the leading Croat HDZ and Serb SNSD parties.

Izetbegovic has a theory that the international community, led by the USA, and the international community's High Representative Christian Schmidt had a role in this.

“They decided to de facto remove the strongest Bosnian Muslim party from power, to bring in an alternative from among the Bosniak people that will make concessions to the Serb and Croat sides that have become aggressive,” said the leader of the SDA.

In an interview with Al Arabiya, Izetbegovic also stated that the historic Bosnian Church was forcibly removed in order to align with the Roman Catholic Church or the Eastern Orthodox Church.

He claims that the teaching of the Bosnian Church was similar to that of Islam, which is why “Islam spread strongly in Bosnia and Herzegovina with the arrival of the Ottomans”.

Izetbegovic also said that in the territory of today's Bosnia and Herzegovina, throughout history no one declared themselves a Serb or a Croat, but as “Bosnians or ‘Bošnjani’ of different faiths” and that this changed under the pressure and influence of Croatia and Serbia.