Original article (in Bosnian) was published on 11/3/2025; Author: Nerma Šehović
Amid a disinformation campaign against USAID, Dzevad Galijasevic accused the agency of financing terrorist organizations such as Al-Qaeda and ISIS, as well as groups in BiH linked to such organizations. There is no evidence that any of this is true.
On February 21, 2025, the News Agency of Republika Srpska (Srna) published an article in which “security expert” Dzevad Galijasevic made a series of claims about the work of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) in Bosnia and Herzegovina and worldwide. Galijasevic accused USAID of financing terrorist organizations and “political Islam” in BiH.
Through Islamic countries, the United States Agency for International Development supported political Islam in BiH, parallel congregations, and organizations linked to global terrorist organizations, said security expert Dzevad Galijasevic in a statement for Srna.
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USAID has financed media, political parties, pro-government organizations, LGBT movements, food projects, educational institutions, the police, the Armed Forces, Wahhabis, Islamic tourism, and deinstitutionalization in BiH, while on a broader scale, it has also supported Ukrainian Nazis, Jordanian Islamists, Afghan Taliban, Al-Qaeda, Al-Nusra, and the Islamic State, Galijasevic claimed.
Galijasevic also said that from 1995 to 2023, Republika Srpska received $625 million from USAID, while the Federation of BiH received the same amount in just two years, 2023 and 2024.
The claims from Srna’s article were republished by Radio-Television of Republika Srpska (RTRS) and Alternative Television (ATV).
Baseless accusations
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has existed since 1961, and its mission is to provide aid to countries recovering from disasters, combating poverty, or implementing democratic reforms. After assuming the presidency of the United States in January of this year, Donald Trump signed an executive order pausing U.S. foreign aid for three months, with the declared goal of evaluating USAID’s programs and aligning them with the new administration’s policies.
Since then, the agency’s work has been the target of attacks and disinformation both in the U.S. and globally, including in BiH. Raskrinkavanje has already addressed some fake claims regarding USAID in previous analyses, which you can read here and here.
Dzevad Galijasevic, who is not actually a “security expert”, did not provide any evidence to support his claims about USAID’s activities. On the contrary, information available to both him and the general public indicates that allegations of financing terrorist organizations are unfounded.
Specifically, USAID employs a partner vetting process to screen organizations before approving funding. This step is mandatory for all programs in Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, Iraq, Lebanon, Pakistan, and Palestine, as these countries are home to groups classified as terrorist organizations by the U.S. The purpose of this screening is to ensure that USAID funds do not end up in the hands of terrorist groups. The suspension of aid, staff layoffs, and other “cuts” implemented or planned by the Trump administration have actually made this process more difficult, according to a document released by the agency on February 10, 2025.
Although precautionary measures are in place, certain oversights have occurred in past years. For example, 53-year-old Syrian Mahmoud Al Hafyan, who led a local NGO between 2015 and 2018, illegally redirected about $9 million in USAID funds intended for humanitarian aid to local leaders of the Al-Nusrah Front terrorist organization. As a result, he was indicted in a U.S. court in 2024 following an investigation conducted by USAID and the FBI (link).
In recent years, USAID, along with other American and international organizations, has allocated significant funds for humanitarian aid in Afghanistan, where about half the population depends on aid for survival. Some of the assistance sent to Afghanistan (not just from USAID but from many humanitarian organizations) has ended up in the hands of the Taliban, who have controlled the country under an authoritarian regime since 2021. However, this is not the intention of the organizations providing aid, rather, cutting off humanitarian assistance would put around 20 million people in Afghanistan at risk of starvation (link).
Therefore, contrary to Dzevad Galijasevic’s claims, USAID has not financed terrorist organizations. In fact, it employs preventive measures to ensure its funds do not end up in the wrong hands. Nonetheless, isolated incidents have occurred, but these were accidental and not part of a deliberate effort to fund terrorist groups.
What has USAID funded in BiH?
USAID has been active in Bosnia and Herzegovina since 1995. Immediately after the war, the agency invested substantial funds in rebuilding infrastructure and the economy. In the following decades, it financed projects in entrepreneurship, tourism, independent media, social assistance, education, social integration, democracy development, and other areas (link).
The claim that USAID invested $625 million in Republika Srpska over 28 years, while providing the same amount to the Federation of BiH in just two years, is absurd. According to an article published in 2023 by Transparency International, Republika Srpska received $620 million from USAID between 1995 and 2020, accounting for 32% of the $1.9 billion the agency invested in BiH during that period.
According to data from Foreignassistance.com, a U.S. government-run website (available here), USAID invested $207.3 million in BiH between 2020 and 2024. After deducting administrative costs, $159.5 million remains, which is far less than the amount Galijasevic claims was invested solely in the Federation of BiH in 2023 and 2024.
There is no evidence that USAID funded “Wahhabis” or “parallel congregations” in BiH. However, there is evidence that the agency allocated funds for projects aimed at combating youth radicalization. The Foreign Assistance website contains data on several USAID-funded projects in BiH focused on preventing and countering extremism.
Dzevad Galijasevic has previously spread misleading and inflammatory claims about terrorism and “political Islam” in BiH. He is closely aligned with the ruling SNSD party in Republika Srpska and has promoted disinformation that supports the party’s propaganda narratives. The RS government has been running a disinformation campaign against USAID for weeks (despite receiving substantial funds from the agency in previous years), and Galijasevic’s statements to Srna perfectly align with his usual themes, terrorism and promoting narratives beneficial to SNSD and its coalition partners.
Therefore, we rate the claim that USAID financed terrorist organizations and parallel congregations in BiH, published by Srna, as fake news and a conspiracy theory. We also rate the claim that USAID invested over $625 million in the Federation of BiH in 2023 and 2024 as fake news.
Other publications that repeat these claims are classified as distribution of fake news and a conspiracy theory.
