Hakija Turajlić was a Bosniak, politician, economist and businessman who served as the Deputy Prime Minister of Bosnia and Herzegovina until he was killed in 1993. Prior to the start of the 1992–1995 war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Turajlić was the director of the multifaceted Bosnian company Energoinvest and as such secured large sums of money for the defense of the country. He was known for his democratic attitude and ability to cooperate, especially for persuading everyone through his own self-denial and hard work. His death at the hands of the Bosnian Serb Army in Stup was one of the great losses that the government was to sustain during the war.
Death
On 8 January 1993 Hakija Turajlić went to Sarajevo International Airport to greet Orhan Sefa Kilercioğlu who accompanied an aid shipment from Turkey. In order to return to Sarajevo he had to pass through Serb-controlled territory for which UNPROFOR was supposed to provide protection. The UN convoy which was taking Turajlić to Sarajevo was stopped by Serb soldiers at an illegal roadblock a few kilometers from the airport. After a 90-minute standoff a French UNPROFOR officer opened the door to the armoured personnel carrier in which Turajlić was sitting and a Serb soldier opened fire with an AK-47. Turajlić was hit with 7–8 rounds. The French troops did not return fire, call for reinforcements — less than six hundred yards away — or detain the killers. British troops who arrived on the scene were ordered to leave. When the same French peacekeepers came home to France, they were decorated for heroism. His murder strained relations between the Bosnian government and UNPROFOR and was also the reason that peace talks in Geneva were cancelled. The UN and the Serbs both refused to cooperate with the Bosnian government investigation and help find the killer. A Bosnian Serb soldier, Goran Vasić, was eventually charged with Turajlić's murder but ultimately acquitted of that charge in 2002. In 1998, a wall about ten meters long and just under two meters high, reminiscent of the Berlin Wall, was put up by Serb residents in Dobrinja after the Bosnian police entered disputed territory under Serb control to arrest Vasić.
Honors
A street in the Dobrinja section of Sarajevo is named in his honor. Boxing tournament Memorijal Hakija Turajlić takes place in Sarajevo every year in his honor. Since 1994 more than 400 boxers from 30 countries participated in this tournament. From 1998 until 2008 it was one of strongest amateur boxing tournaments in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
