Three Arrested in Bosnia for Election Fraud in Srebrenica

Officers of Bosnia's State Investigation and Protection Agency, SIPA, arrested three people on Tuesday in Srebrenica and the Tuzla area for election fraud during local elections in mid-November.

"The suspects were arrested for the criminal offence of document forgery and illegal use of personal data," said SIPA spokesman Luka Miladinovic, adding that the charges related to the last local election in Srebrenica.

During the arrest, police temporarily confiscated several mobile phones, diaries, copies of excerpts from voter lists, a gun and other items.

Citing police sources, Bosnian media reported that the arrested persons were Bosniaks and members of the Social Democratic Party of Bosnia and Herzegovina, SDP.

The same reports said the three were suspected of illegally using the personal data of Bosnian citizens in order to casts vote by post from Serbia in favour of incumbent Srebrenica mayor Mladen Grujicic, a Bosnian Serb.

During an emergency telephone meeting on Tuesday, the SDP Presidency took the decision to dissolve the Srebrenica branch of the party and to expel local SDP leader Bega Bektic, accusing him of participating in actions that "irrevocably damaged the reputation of the SDP in Srebrenica."

The party called on Bosnia's Central Election Commission to annul and re-run the election for the mayor of Srebrenica if it is found that incumbent Mladen Grujicic won re-election via fraud.

Preliminary results put Grujicic ahead with 58.55 per cent of the vote, ahead of Alija Tabakovic of the Party of Democratic Action, SDA, the main Bosniak party in the country, on 40.88 per cent.

The difference between the two candidates is less than 1,500 votes.

Elections in Srebrenica are closely watched, 25 years...