EU diplomacy chief voices concerns over Bosnia

Sarajevo’s City Hall is illuminated with the colours of the flags of European Union and Bosnia and Herzegovina, late on May 9, 2021, to mark the Day of Europe. AFP FILE PHOTO

MUNICH — The political situation in Bosnia is “more worrying than ever,” EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said Sunday, as a push for secession by Bosnian Serbs fuels fears of a return to inter-community conflict.

“The situation in Bosnia is more worrying than ever, it has never been easy but the centrifugal trends now are really very worrying,” he told the Munich Security Conference.

Following wars in the 1990s that killed roughly 100,000 people, a Nato intervention in the Bosnian conflict led to the Dayton Accords, which divided the country along ethnic lines in a bid to prevent future intercommunal violence.

One half of the country was given over to Bosnian Serbs while the other was to be ruled by a Muslim-Croat federation.

The two entities are held together by federal institutions — once weak but gradually beefed up over the years by a UN-appointed high representative.

But tensions soared as Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik — a former Western protege turned nationalist — ramped up his threats of secession before appearing to backtrack earlier this month.

Borrell appealed to the “responsibility of the political leaders in Bosnia to prevent the country from breaking up”, urging them rather to carry out necessary constitutional and electoral reforms.

“We will not accept a breaking up and the disintegration of Bosnia,” he said, noting that the issue will be discussed by  EU foreign ministers on Monday.

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