© Reuters
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The international community’s High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina, Christian Schmidt, has veiled but vehemently criticized the West for failing to act in a crisis that could pave the way for ethnic tensions and, in the worst case scenario, the break-up of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Tensions are mounting a week before the upcoming vote to withdraw Republika Srpska from institutions such as the national armed forces on December 10th. In Europe, some countries are proposing new sanctions against Serbian Presidency member Milorad Dodik. Schmid warned that if that happened, is moving towards de facto secession of Republika Srpska.
Dodik himself arrived in Moscow weeks after announcing the process of separating the institutions, using the decision of his previous representative, Valentin Inzko, as the occasion. to criminalize the denial of genocide and the glorification of war crimes in the country.
In an interview with the Bosnian edition Liberation Schmidt criticized the inaction of the EU and the United States in the escalation of Republika Srpska, days before parliament in the capital of the constituent part, Banja Luka, voted to withdraw from federal institutions.
“We can’t pretend that we just have to be kind to Dodik and ask him what he wants to be next,” Schmid said. If the international community does not notice that there is no smoke without fire in the region, it seems to be simply removing it from the map of crisis hotspots, he continued.
Schmid also warns that harsh statements in the Balkans should not be overlooked:
“As someone who has known Dodik for years, here is a small note to the international community: even if we allow the Balkans to have waves of sharp rhetoric, a little stronger than elsewhere, we need to be smart enough to understand that rhetoric politics is being made. I don’t know if that mind has existed for the past ten years. “
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High Representative of the International Community in Bosnia and Herzegovina
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Russia is heating up tensions
Dodik himself arrived in Bosnia today for a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, saying he would do so “in the coming days” in an interview published this week by the British Guardian. There, he said that if sanctions against Bosnia and Herzegovina were tightened, Russia and China will come to the rescue.
This feeling is also reproduced in some Russian media. He is an example “Merchant”, where the title is “Milorad Dodik has arrived for an ambulance”. The leader “expects political support from Vladimir Putin,” the newspaper said. The paper quoted Balkan experts as saying Dodik could be useful in preventing Bosnia’s integration into NATO.
Dodik and Russia also have common ground in questioning Schmid’s legitimacy. Moscow believes that it should have been approved at the UN in another way, and Dodik – that “unelected foreigners” should not be able to make decisions like that of his predecessor Inzko (although they have the right to do so).
Against this background, the English version of “Truth” added fuel to the fire, raising the issue of whether Russian forces should be sent to Bosnia in an article titled “Republika Srpska needs Dodik’s helping hand”.
This tossing goes hand in hand with subheadings such as “Republika Srpska wants to be a sovereign country” or “NATO soldiers or Russian soldiers in Republika Srpska?”. “Let’s see how Putin can help Republika Srpska,” the text concluded, recalling Russian forces as part of an international peacekeeping contingent transferred to Kosovo in 1999.
Some countries are already responding
In fact, in some countries, concerns are growing. A debate on the risks of disintegration of Bosnia began tonight in the British House of Commons. Hours earlier, the United Kingdom had appointed a four-star Air Force officer and former Chief of Staff of the British Armed Forces, Stuart Peach, as special envoy to the Western Balkans. They are in the motives quoted the Special Representative’s warnings that Bosnia is in a period of “its greatest existential threat in the post-war period”.
This is important because London is part of the Peacebuilding Council in Bosnia, an international agency set up in the British capital in the mid-1990s.
The Council also derives the so-called powers of Bonn, with which the High Representative of the International Community has the right to unilateral and unaccountable legislative activity, if they believe that the Bosnian elite does not have the political will for a concrete step.
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Turkey also has a seat on the Peacebuilding Council. At the same time, Ankara has been criticized in Sarajevo for being cautious in its comments, despite warm ties, at least with Bosniaks in the country. Moreover, Turkey represents the Organization of Islamic Cooperation in the council and expresses the will of dozens of countries with predominantly Muslim populations.
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