A meeting between the Prime Minister of Bosnia’s northwestern Una-Sana Canton (USK) and members of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) was met with strong criticism by the main Bosniak party in the country.

According to the USK branch of the Party for Democratic Action (SDA), Mustafa Ruznic’s meeting with representatives of “the extreme right-wing Alternative for Germany” represents an “insult” and proves Ruznic’s incompetence and “lack of any moral values or principles.”

The SDA noted that Germany’s security service has recently placed the Alternative for Germany (AfD) under surveillance as an organisation suspected of far-right extremism.

“Ruznic welcomes the officials of that party and participates in their campaign of spreading xenophobia and anti-Muslim racism that party is known for,” the SDA said.

It said that the USK Prime Minister should “apologise to thousands of Bosniaks living in Germany who were, as immigrants, targeted by the AfD and their supporters, as well as Bosniaks in USK in BiH whom he embarrassed and insulted by meeting with representatives of the party which is perceived as neo-Nazi in Europe.”

However, Ruznic’s party, the People’s European Alliance (NES), called the SDA’s reaction a “cheap media spin, the goal of which was to divert attention from the poor management of the SDA-led government in the pandemic and the state’s shameful reception of a box of vaccines from the proven right-wing radical Islamophobe and Srebrenica genocide denier, (Serbian President) Aleksandar Vucic,” referring to a donation of 5,000 vaccines Serbia sent to Bosnia.

It said the SDA is trying to present the meeting with Berlin City Assembly representatives as a “scandal” and that “bringing the People's European Union and Prime Minister Ruznic into any connection with the anti-Islamic policy advocated by some parts of the Alternative for Germany is frivolous.”

It would have been “distasteful and scandalous” if local authorities would have refused to meet with the German officials, it argued.

“Germany is a country that we all in Bosnia and Herzegovina perceive as friendly and it is our obligation to conduct dialogues with its representatives even when we do not agree with their policies or parts of those policies,” the NES said.