Bosnian Muslim politician says that the Islamic terrorist with European features that are based in Bosnia are more dangerous for the security of Europe then the 'White al-Qaeda' with bases in Kosovo, reports Croatian daily Vecernji List. 

 

"In Bosnia and Herzegovina today al-Qaeda is in a strategic planning phase. This means that, among such potentials - and it is likely that there are 100,000 such believers - you can find five people... to hang bombs on their belts and bring in explosives," says Dzevad Galijasevic, chairman of the New Democratic Party in Bosnia and an author of the recently published book The Era of Terrorism in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

 

Mr. Galijasevic says that the international community does not attach a high level of importance to the presence of 'White al-Qaeda' because Bosnia is not the target of terrorist activities.

It is clear," concludes Galijasevic that the al-Qaeda cells in Bosnia "are waiting for EU accession; thus, this white, European physiognomy and anthropology - the so-called 'white al-Qaeda' - can in fact be the most fatal for Europe, while Bosnia-Herzegovina is an insignificant target for al-Qaeda."

In August of 2007, US diplomat Raffi Gregorian said in an interview for a Sarajevo daily that al-Qaeda uses Bosnia as a transit point but labeled the local Bosnian Muslims not as "sleeper" cells but as "helper" cells.

"There are sympathizers in the country who are ready to help al-Qaeda with hiding agents, providing financial support or providing false documents," said Gregorian, the principal deputy to Miroslav Lajcak who is the top international administrator of Bosnia.

The head of the Bosnian Muslim anti-terrorism Special Services unit, SIPA, Aner Hadzimahumutovic, immediately reacted against Gregorian's statement saying that the unit "has no information on anyone with ties to the terrorist organization al-Qaeda living in the country."

The top international administrator of Bosnia, Miroslav Lajcak, recently issued an order that forces Bosnian Serb police units to be merged with these Bosnian Muslim ones to which Serbs object.

In his recent book Al-Qaeda In Bosnia Herzegovina: Myth Or Present Danger, senior editor for the South Slavic and Albanian Languages Service with the Prague-based Radio Free Europe, Vlado Azinovic, says that the al-Qaeda has "enjoyed protection and support from the highest ranks of the Bosniak political and intelligence establishment" but blames the existence of the Serb Republic as the real threat to Europe.

"My book maintains that the presence of Wahhabism and of the remaining mujahedin do not qualify Bosnia as a particular threat to international security," Azinovic says and adds that "the establishment of the Serb Republic" makes Bosnia a divided country whose "borders are porous and susceptible to human and drug trafficking, while weapons and ammunition are still readily available."

"Bosniak intellectual elite are at quite a distance from the battleground where this battle is fought - in mosques, rural settlements, villages, and among the insufficiently educated population," says Mr. Galijasevic whose book includes names and activities of 1,250 of al-Qaeda members who have domiciled in Bosnia, got married with locals and enjoy political protection.

"I identified their political protectors such as Haris Silajdzic, Hasan Cengic, Alija Izetbegovic, and Bakir Izetbegovic, as well as their protectors in the police such as Semsudin Mehmedovic, who is currently the deputy chairman of the committee overseeing SIPA and police reform expert," says Galijasevic.

Haris Silajdzic is currently the President of Bosnian Muslims.

In 2004, Abdurahman Khadr, the son of the killed Pakistani al-Qaeda operative Ahmed Said Khadr, says that the CIA helped him settle in Bosnia and asked him to spy on the the largest Mosques in Sarajevo, the King Fahd mosque, ran by a local Bosnian Muslim Imam Nezim Halilovic Muderis known for extremist preaching.

At the Sarajevo Mosque, Abdurahman became friendly with a Bosnian Muslim recruiter for al-Qaeda operations in Iraq.

"I took his name and gave it to them [CIA] and they said 'well, this is a very good contact.' They were very happy that I made this contact," said Abdurahman for the Canadian Broadcast Corporation.

Galijasevic says that Islamist activities such as these are pushing the Bosnian Muslims into a whirlpool of problems of other Islamic countries and are moving Bosnia closer to Palestine rather then their Christian neighbors, Serbs and Croats.

"It is turning Muslims' true historical brothers, Serbs and Croats, into eternal and irreconcilable enemies," says Galijasevic.

"Never before in Islam did we have decapitation and taking pictures with severed heads, which symbolizes severance of all links with Christianity," explains Galijasevic.