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Turkey has asked Bosnia and Herzegovina to extradite Ozer Ozsaray on suspicion that he is a member of a terrorist organisation aiming to overthrow the state, a hearing at the Bosnian state court in Sarajevo was told on Thursday.
Prosecutor Kasim Halilcevic said that the Turkish Supreme Court has launched an investigation into Ozsaray for the criminal act of “membership of the FETO armed terrorist organisation”.
“We are maintaining our proposal that measures be imposed on Ozsaray, banning him from leaving his place of residence and only allowing him to move inside the borders of the Sarajevo Canton, and seizing his travel documents,” Halilcevic told the court.
Ankara accuses Ozsaray of involvement in the failed coup in Turkey in July 2016, which it claims was organised by exiled cleric Fethullah Gulen’s network.
The Turkish authorities describe Gulen’s network as the Fethullah Terrorist Organisation, or FETO.
Bosnia and Herzegovina does not recognise it as a terror group, however, and the state court has denied a previous Turkish extradition request because of this.
Ozsaray objected to his extradition, insisting that he had not committed any crimes.
He also objected to the proposal for the temporary seizure of his passport, although he agreed to have his movement restricted to the Sarajevo Canton.
“The evidence provided shows that I opened a school, established an association of businessmen, that I am the owner of a local newspaper and advertising agency, which I have managed. That is the evidence,” Ozsaray said.
“I was neither a member of some terrorist organisation nor did I take up arms except during my military service. I consider this to be a state act of a political nature,” he added.
Ozsaray said he filed an asylum request to the Bosnian authorities in July last year because he wants to be “peaceful and free”.
The next hearing in the case is scheduled for November 29.
Turkey’s government has vowed to track down and bring home people it sees as linked to Gulen, who lives in exile in the US.
Ankara has also put countries in the Balkans under strong pressure to close down any educational or charitable institutions linked to Gulen.
Kosovo and Bulgaria have both returned suspected ‘Gulenists’ to Turkey despite sharp criticism from rights organisations.
