Izetbegovic, Alija

I·zet·beg·o·vić (ĭ'zĕt-bĕgʹə-vĭch), Alija. Born 1925.

Bosnian lawyer and politician who was elected president of Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1990.

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▪ 2004

      Bosniac politician (b. Aug. 8, 1925, Bosanski Samac, Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes—d. Oct. 19, 2003, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina), was a devout Muslim nationalist who was elected president of the Yugoslav republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina in December 1990; his declaration of independence in April 1992 triggered a horrifically bloody ethnic conflict between Serbs, Croats, and Muslims that lasted for more than three and a half years and left the region politically divided and economically shattered. The Dayton (Ohio) peace accords, which were signed in Paris in December 1995, allocated 51% of the disputed territory to an independent Bosnia and Herzegovina. The next year Izetbegovic was elected head of the new nation's three-member collective presidency; he retired in 2000.

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