Bosnia Arrests 3 on Terrorism Charges

Three Bosnian Islamists were arrested in Sarajevo on Thursday on charges of terrorism and illegal weapons trafficking, prosecutors said.

Rijad Rustempasic, Edis Velic and Abdulah Handzic were arrested on charges of terrorism, the Prosecutor's Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina said in a statement.  

Rustempasic was also suspected of illegal weapons trafficking, the statement added.

The arrest follows an intense investigation including interviews with “nearly 70 different witnesses and several suspects, and collected over 1000 pieces of evidence from here in Bosnia, as well as from Germany and Austria, and elsewhere," prosecutors said.

All three suspects were previously detained by Bosnian authorities in March last year, but were released after three months in detention for the lack of evidence.

Prosecutors refused to provide specific information, but Bosnian media previously reported the three were linked with terrorist groups in Austria and Germany and were planning to attack European Union peacekeepers and Catholic shrines in Bosnia.

Their specific targets were planned to include soldiers of the EU countries with forces in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as a Franciscan Monastery in Fojnica, central Bosnia.

All three arrested men were reported to be the followers of the strict Saudi-interpretation of Islam, known as Wahhabism.

The twin brother of one of the suspects, Muhamed Rustempasic, has also been detained by Bosnian police and remains under police custody.

Muhamed Rustempasic, who lives in Vienna, had been arrested in September while trying to cross the Bosnian border upon visiting relatives in Sarajevo.

Muhamed Rustempasic was arrested as a flight risk on a charge of illegal weapons trafficking, involving his brother.

‘’The investigation....is coming towards an end, but there are still a number of matters to be looked into, some new evidence to be evaluated, and a few witnesses still to be located," the prosecutors' statement said.

‘’It should also be known that other person(s) may be arrested in connection with this matter in the future," it added.