In 1938 he joined the Communist Party of Yugoslavia and became a Party organizer. In 1941, he joined Yugoslav Partisans and he was member of partisans' brigade "Zvijezda" of Vareš. In 1942, during World War II, he was caught by the Ustaše in Sarajevo and was tortured by them and sentenced to death. With the help of Yugoslav Partisans he escaped and in 1945 with the war ending in victory over the Axis powers, the Communists came into power and Zulfikarpašić was appointed Deputy Minister of Trade. He soon became disillusioned with Josip Broz Tito's government and fled into exile in Zurich, Switzerland.
Fall of Yugoslavia
At the beginning of the Party of Democratic Action, the party also included a very influential secular nationalist grouping, led by Adil Zulfikarpašić and Muhamed Filipović. On 26 December 1991, Serbia, Montenegro, and the Serb rebel-held territory in Croatia agreed that they would form a new "third Yugoslavia". Efforts were also made in 1991 to include Bosnia and Herzegovina within the federation, with negotiations between Milošević, Bosnia's Serbian Democratic Party, and the Bosniak proponent of union – Bosnia's Vice-President Adil Zulfikarpašić taking place on this matter. Zulfikarpašić believed that Bosnia could benefit from attempting to forge a union with Serbia, Montenegro, and Krajina; and promoted a compromise between the Serbs and Bosniaks, in which Serb Krajina and Bosniak Sanjak from Serbia would be annexed into a Greater Bosnia that within a union with Serbia and Montenegro, would secure both the unity of Serbs and Bosniaks. Zulfikarpašić's proposition opposed any cantonization of Bosnia. The Bosnian Serbs did not include Zulfikarpašić's proposition alongside their propositions. However Milosevic continued negotiations with Zulfikarpašić to include Bosnia within a new Yugoslavia. Efforts to include the whole of Bosnia within a new Yugoslavia effectively terminated by late 1991 as Izetbegović planned to hold a referendum on independence while the Bosnian Serbs and Bosnian Croats formed autonomous territories. Zulfikarpašić returned to Bosnia and Herzegovina and in the lead up to the Bosnian War, as Bosnia and Herzegovina held an independence referendum for independence, Zulfikarpašić stood alongside the future Bosnian president, Alija Izetbegović. He was a member of Izetbegovic's Party of Democratic Action, but soon formed another party because of differing political views, the Muslim Bosniak Organization with Muhamed Filipović.
