Former Bosnian leader Alija Izetbegovic dies at 78 in Sarajevo hospital

Alija Izetbegovic, the inaugural president of Bosnia and Herzegovina, died at 78 in Sarajevo’s Kosevo hospital, which overlooks many siege graves. Rising from obscurity in the late 1980s, he helped create the Democratic Action Party and led it to a decisive victory in the 1990 multi-party elections. As president from 1990-96 and co-president until 2000, he guided the nation through the violent breakup of Yugoslavia, surviving Serbian and Croatian assaults, a prolonged siege of Sarajevo, and fraught negotiations with Western mediators.

His leadership culminated in the 1995 Dayton peace agreement that halted the war. Despite criticism for ethnic politics and occasional missteps, he is remembered as a modest figure who steered Bosnia through its most perilous years.