Alija Izetbegović

Alija Izetbegović (1925-2003), president of Bosnia and Herzegovina (1990-2000), a republic of the former Yugoslavia that was torn apart by civil war from 1992 to 1995. Born to a Muslim family in Bosanski Šamac, in northern Bosnia, Izetbegović graduated with a law degree from the University of Sarajevo. In 1946 he was arrested by Yugoslavia’s newly established Communist regime for “pan-Islamic activity” and served three years in prison. Upon his release, Izetbegović studied law and worked as a legal consultant in Bosnia. He was arrested again in 1983 for disseminating “Islamic propaganda” and sentenced to 14 years in prison. He was released in 1988.

The collapse of Communism throughout Eastern Europe in 1989 and 1990 led to the legalization of non-Communist political parties in Yugoslavia’s republics. Izetbegović founded the Party of Democratic Action (PDA), a secular-nationalist Bosnian Muslim (Bosniak) party, in May 1990. The PDA won a plurality of votes in the November 1990 elections, and Izetbegović became president of a seven-member collective state presidency made up of two representatives each for Bosniaks, Serbs, and Croats, and one representative for all other groups. As president, Izetbegović attempted to preserve Bosnia and Herzegovina as a multinational republic within Yugoslavia after Croatia, Slovenia, and then Macedonia seceded from the federation in 1991. However, tensions escalated between the republic’s three major ethnic groups, and Serbian nationalists began claiming parts of the republic as autonomous areas. In March 1992 a referendum on independence was held in Bosnia and Herzegovina; the vast majority of Bosniaks and Croats voted in favor of independence, while most Serbs boycotted the vote. Izetbegović’s government issued a declaration of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s independence that same month. In response, Bosnian Serb separatists declared their own Serb Republic (Republika Srpska), Croatian nationalists consolidated their control of territories they claimed, and armed conflict broke out in early April. see Yugoslav Succession, Wars of.

In November 1995 Izetbegović, along with Croatian president Franjo Tudjman and Serbian president Slobodan Milošević, established a comprehensive peace accord near Dayton, Ohio (see Dayton Peace Accord). The accord, which gave 51 percent of the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina to a Bosniak-Croat federation (officially known as the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina) and the remainder to the Serb Republic, was signed in Paris the following month. According to the agreement, the Bosniak-Croat federation and the Serb Republic would share a central legislature and a three-member collective presidency. In addition, each of the two entities would have its own president and legislature.

In September 1996 Bosnia held national elections. Izetbegović was elected to the Bosniak seat of the country’s three-member collective presidency. As the leading vote-getter, he became the chairman of the presidency. In September 1998 Izetbegović was reelected to the collective presidency. Although he was the top vote-getter among the three members of the presidency, the chairmanship rotated to the Bosnian Serb representative, Zivko Radišić. Izetbegović resigned from the collective presidency in October 2000, citing his age and his health for his decision to step down.