SARAJEVO Bosnian Muslim leader Alija Izetbegovic stepped down Saturday from the country's tripartite presidency, two years before his mandate was to expire, without having fulfilled his dream of seeing a reunified and rebuilt Bosnia.
"As I announced earlier, I have decided to step down from the presidency before my mandate expires. The reasons for which I undertook this step are known to the people", AFP quoted Izetbegovic as saying in his farewell speech at an official ceremony here.
Izetbegovic, 75, the hero of Muslim resistance in the 1992-95 Bosnian war, announced his retirement earlier this year due to his failing health and advanced age.
He has suffered two heart attacks and said he was no longer in the "physical and psychological shape" for the post.
"With handing over the chairmanship today, I am ending my membership with the presidency too," he said Saturday.
At the ceremony, he handed over the Muslim seat in the three-way presidency on an interim basis to Halid Genjac, current speaker of Bosnia's House of Representatives, until the Parliament elects his successor.
He left the presidency's rotating chairmanship to Serb member Zivko Radisic.
The Muslim, Croat and Serb members of the Bosnian presidency rotate as chairman every eight months, within a four-year term.
Izetbegovic plans to remain president of his Party of Democratic Action (SDA) and has said he will still work to achieve his dream of a unified, democratic and prosperous Bosnia.
The SDA, which has ruled for the past decade alongside ethnic parties representing Bosnian Serbs and Croats, has been accused by the international community of trying to dominate the multiethnic state.
Izetbegovic has countered by accusing the international community, which is heavily involved in the Bosnian peace process, of trying to reduce the influence of Muslims, who make up more than 40 percent of the country's population.
Almost five years since the Dayton Peace Accords ended the war, Bosnia remains divided along ethnic lines, with a weak central government that hardly functions.
A former dissident of the Yugoslav communist regime, Izetbegovic led the Muslim-dominated Bosnian government that supported the concept of a multiethnic Bosnian state throughout the brutal 1992-95 war, in which more than 200,000 people were killed.
The war was triggered by the country's declaration of independence from the former Yugoslavia, a move rejected by pro-Belgrade Bosnian Serbs.
Despite $5.2 billion in foreign aid for postwar reconstruction and strong international community involvement in setting up its institutions, Bosnia has failed to establish a self-sustaining economy.
Some 1.2 million Bosnian refugees are still unable to return to their prewar homes, mainly due to their ethnicity.