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Bosnia jails Islamists for planning attacks

Thu, 10 Nov 2011 15:11 GMT

Source: reuters // Reuters

SARAJEVO, Nov 10 (Reuters) - Bosnia's state court jailed three radical Islamists on Thursday for up to 4-1/2 years for planning attacks on non-Muslim targets, including European Union peacekeepers, in the Balkan country in 2007-08.

The trio, led by Rijad Rustempasic, was found guilty on terrorism charges for forming an organised group that planned attacks against Bosnia's Christian Orthodox Serbs and Catholic Croats during their religious holidays, the verdict said.

They had also planned to target members of the EU peacekeeping force, EUFOR, in central Bosnia, said court council president Mirsad Strikan.

"They acted from positions of ethnic and religious extremism, maintaining that Bosnia needs to be organised as a sharia (Islamic law) state," Strikan said.

"They acted to ... spread fear among the population and undermine Bosnia-Herzegovina's constitutional and political structure and inflict serious damage to the state and international organisations."

The verdict came almost two weeks after an Islamist gunman fired the U.S. embassy in the capital Sarajevo, rattling Bosnia's overwhelmingly moderate Muslim community and raising fresh questions over the threat of radical Islam in the Balkans.

A police sniper shot the gunman, a 23-year-old Muslim from neighbouring Serbia, in the leg and he was arrested.

In Thursday's case, group leader Rustemovic was sentenced to 4-1/2 years in prison. His co-accused were jailed for 3 years and four months.

Police found a large cache of automatic weapons, explosives and bombs in their possession, as well as videos showing terrorist attacks committed by Islamist extremists across the world and instructions on how to prepare attacks.

Some young Bosnian Muslims, particularly those from impoverished rural areas, have turned to the strict Wahhabi branch of Islam in recent years, under the influence of foreigners who fought in the 1992-95 war.

Six radical Islamists are currently on trial over a bomb attack last year on a police station in central Bosnia, in which one policeman was killed and several others were wounded. (Reporting By Daria Sito-Sucic; Editing by Matt Robinson and Mark Heinrich)