Bosnian police and judicial authorities opened Friday investigations after the grave of the former Bosnia’s president and Muslim leader Alija Izetbegovic in Sarajevo was badly damaged in an explosion early Friday morning.

A strong explosion, according to Sarajevo Police spokesman Jusuf Zornic, occurred in early morning hours, badly damaging the grave and monument of Alija Izetbegovic at the Kovaci memorial cemetery, some five kilometers north-east of the city’s center.

The explosion, he told reporters, also damaged a number of cars near the cemetery and broke windows at the nearby houses.

Police deployed in the Kovaci area immediately afterwards.

Bosnian State Prosecutor Miroslav Markovic, who went to the scene, said the explosive device badly damaged the monument to Izetbegovic and made a 70-centimeter hole in the grave.

The mortal remains of the late president, according to Markovic, were not desecrated.

The prosecutor did not further comment on the crime, saying only the explosion on Izetbegovic’s grave was ‘a terrorist act with the political motives.’

Izetbegovic’s successor in the Bosnia’s tripartite state Presidency and at the top of the Muslim nationalist Party of Democratic Action (SDA), Sulejman Tihic, condemned the act.

The top international community official in Bosnia, High Representative Christian Schwarz-Schilling, also strongly

Alija Izetbegovic died in Sarajevo in October 2003 after a prolongued illness.

He was the first Bosnian president after country became independent from the former Yugoslav federation in early 1990s.

Izetbegovic led the country from 1990 to 2000, when he withdrew from the Presidency due to his illness and age.

He completely withdrew from the political life in 2001, when he resigned from the top post of the SDA party.

PHOTO CAPTION

Bosnian police investigators search the scene at Kovaci cemetery in Sarajevo. (AFP)