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Asim Sarajlic, a delegate to the Bosnia and Herzegovina Parliamentary Assembly and a senior official in Bosnia’s leading Democratic Action Party (SDA), resigned from all political posts Wednesday. At a news conference, Sarajlic said he made the decision because of sanctions imposed by the US Treasury Department on April 11th.
“Although I have not been convicted of any first or last degree crime, I believe that – due to the decision of the American authorities to put me on the list of sanctioned persons – it is my obligation to resign,” he said. Sarajlic.
“As a responsible person, for whom the interest of the state is above all, I do not want to be, in any way, an obstacle in the implementation of joint strategic plans and partnerships between Bosnia and the United States,” he said.
The United States, Sarajlic said, is a true long-term friend and strategic partner of Bosnia, and “no individual should be an obstacle to continued co-operation.”
He added that he would be available to the Bosnian judiciary at all times, “fully convinced” that he would “prove his innocence”.
The US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) published on April 11th a list of those sanctioned for corruption, which includes seven people from the Western Balkans.
From Bosnia, in addition to Sarajlic, there is also the former chief prosecutor of this country Gordana Tadic, as well as former MP Aqif Rakipi and businessman Ylli Ndroqi.
Former senior Democratic Party of Socialists official Svetozar Marovic is from Montenegro, while former Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski and former head of the country’s Security and Counterintelligence Directorate Sasho Mijalkov are from northern Macedonia.
Undersecretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Brian E. Nelson said the sanctioned people “pose a serious threat to regional stability, institutional trust and the aspirations of those who want democratic and prudent governance in the Western Balkans.”
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