BOSNIA and Herzegovinay Trends in Conflict and Cooperation

Bosnia and Herzegovina | No 4 | July to August 2007 BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA| Trends in Conflict and Cooperation Incoming High Representative Miroslav Lajcak took up office on July 1 and was greeted by a continuation of the stalemate that has marked Bosnia-Herzegovina’s domestic politics since the Cooperative and conflictive domestic events (relative) general election of October 2006. As the adjacent graph shows, domestic conflictive events continued to outnumber domestic cooperative events during the reporting period. Under Prime Minister Milorad Dodik, who is very popular among Bosnian Serbs, the Republika Srpska (RS) has been refusing to give up control over its police force even though the removal of Bosnia’s various police forces from political control is at the center of reforms needed for closer ties with the European Union. Bosnia has concluded technical talks on a Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA) with Brussels but has been unable to sign the SAA because of its failure to pass the required reforms (including police reform). RS’ insistence on Source: FAST event data keeping its own force prompted the two largest Bosniak parties to reject the latest police reform proposals at the end of August. During July and August, Dodik’s paramount goal is still to preserve all the prerogatives given to Bosnia’s two entities – the RS and the Bosniak-Croat Federation – under the 1995 Dayton peace accords. This caused problems with Bosniak representative on Bosnia’s three-member presidency, Haris Silajdzic who advocates a unified state without entities. Dodik’s threats to seek a referendum on independence for RS in case the nominally Serbian province of Kosovo gains independence (as foreseen under a UN-sponsored plan) prompted Lajcak’s office (OHR) to issue a harshly-worded statement that activities running counter to the Dayton accords would not be tolerated. This did not seem to diminish Dodik’s appetite for controversy, however, who described Bosnia as an “obstacle” to the further development of the RS. Representatives of Dodik’s and Silajdzic’s parties hold key portfolios in the Bosnian government but relations within the Council of Ministers are tense. Evidence of tension came in late July and early August with public recriminations between Foreign Minister Sven Alkalaj, a Jewish member of Silajdzic’s predominantly-Bosniak party, and Chairman of the Council of Ministers Nikola Spiric, a Bosnian Serb from Dodik’s party. Spiric’s criticism implied that Alkalaj could not claim to represent any of Bosnia’s three main ethnic groups, a charge that was countered by Alkalaj with accusations of anti-Semitism. The fight prompted Prime Minister Spiric to call for a partial cabinet reshuffle after the summer break. Lajcak, a top Slovak diplomat with extensive experience in the Balkans, generally performed well during his first two months in office. His dismissal of Bosnian Serb policemen suspected of involvement in war crimes (see below) provoked criticism in the RS but did not seem to diminish his authority with politicians of all stripes. In his second week in office, High Representative Lajcak dismissed 36 staff of the Bosnian Serb police suspected of involvement in the war crimes that followed the fall of Srebrenica to Serb forces in July 1995. The dismissal and prosecution of policemen whose names showed up on a list produced under international pressure by the RS authorities in connection with the crimes in Srebrenica had been a key demand of Bosniak protesters from Srebrenica who had camped out in Sarajevo for several months earlier this year. An on-going review of naturalizations, especially of foreign Muslims who came to Bosnia to fight in the war, has resulted in some 500 revocations of citizenships, according to the head of the joint Bosnian-international ad-hoc commission conducting the process. Of the 500 persons whose citizenship was revoked, 330 have not lived in Bosnia for years. The commission will now start reviewing naturalizations of some 15,000 citizens of other former Yugoslav republics. The commission’s work has been criticized since its decisions cannot be appealed, which raises fears of arbitrary treatment. Reports indicate that no actual deportations have been carried out to date. FAST Update | Bosnia and Herzegovina| No 4 | July to August 2007 The Federation government adopted new regulations that allow former members of the Federation armed forces and the Federation Ministry of Defense (both no longer in operation) to retire under favorable conditions if they have not been able to find employment within the Bosnia-Herzegovina armed forces or the state-level Ministry of Defense. The decision is likely to put additional burdens on the Federation’s pension system and may negatively affect current pensioners, making pension increases unlikely. The entire Balkan Peninsula experienced extreme temperatures for much of July and August, and Bosnia was no exception. Croatian authorities blamed forest fires threatening the heritage site of Dubrovnik in Croatia a few kilometers from the Bosnian border on insufficient countermeasures by the Bosnian authorities, which revealed a lack of coordination between authorities at different levels. As a result of the drought, some 30-40 percent of Bosnian crops were reportedly destroyed, prompting fears of price hikes on flour. This situation is exacerbated by the fact that neighboring countries were equally affected and will therefore not be able to make up for the shortfall through increased exports to Bosnia. Already, bread prices have risen in Una Sana and Podrinje Cantons and other regions may follow. While several emergency measures are being considered – for example, the lifting of customs duties on crop imports from the developing world – trade unions are also asking state and entity governments to eliminate VAT on basic foodstuffs. Just before the Bosnian parliament went on its summer recess, it postponed a vote on the ratification of the Central European Free Trade Agreement (CEFTA), a trade deal aiming to replace over 30 bilateral agreements in the region with a single framework for free trade. CEFTA is controversial since many Bosnian businesses, especially agricultural producers, fear that they will not survive competition from abroad (particularly from Serbia and Croatia). This summer’s drought has added to political pressure for higher agricultural subsidies and other protectionist measures. The continuing uncertainty over the final status of Kosovo has greatly complicated matters across the entire region. Any solution reaffirming Serbian sovereignty over Kosovo – an extremely remote prospect – would strengthen the nationalist government of Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica in its claim to represent all Serbs, while an independent Kosovo – by far the most likely outcome – would boost the notion that the RS should be allowed to secede from Bosnia (an argument dismissed by most observers and international lawyers but popular with Serbs across the region). Dodik has been exploiting the Western fear of destabilization and generally played into Kostunica’s strategy of relying on a Russian veto at the UN as well as unease among certain EU members about Kosovar independence. The forthcoming status decision on Kosovo, generally expected after the end of the current negotiation period ending in December, will keep Western policymakers focused on the Balkans. Dodik and his camp of “Dayton fundamentalists” – politicians who want to preserve the status quo above all – will exploit the Kosovo issue as far as it will carry them. High Representative Lajcak, whose understanding of his mandate appears quite a bit more robust than that of his predecessor, will check Dodik’s rhetoric but the importance of closing a deal on police reform may well push the international community to accept a compromise (widely expected for September) that falls short of the original goal. Fall is also likely to bring renewed movement on constitutional reform. Contact FAST International is the early warning program of swisspeace, FAST International covering 25 countries/regions in Africa, Asia and Europe. Based in Country Team: Bosnia and Herzegovina Bern, Switzerland, the program is funded and utilized by an Sonnenbergstrasse 17 international consortium of development agencies, including the 3000 Bern 7 Austrian Development Agency (ADA), the Canadian International Switzerland Development Agency (CIDA), the Swedish International Development [email protected] Cooperation Agency (Sida) and the Swiss Agency for Development and www.swisspeace.org Cooperation (SDC). .

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