Bosnian Serbs Pledge to End EU Logjam

Bosnian Serbs signalled readiness to compromise over the question of Bosnia’s stalled EU membership process following a meeting on Thursday with Peter Sorensen, Head of the EU delegation and Special EU Representative to Bosnia and Herzegovina.  

After the meeting, Milorad Dodik, President of one of Bosnia’s two autonomous entities, the Serb-dominated Republika Srpska, said he was “ready to support separating the issues that hold back Bosnia’s application for EU membership in order to get them resolved and provide a chance for BiH to apply for candidate status”.

Dodik added that he was referring to implementation of a 2009 ruling by the European Court of Justice in the case of Sejdic-Finci vs. Bosnia, adoption of a law on a census and adoption of a law on a system of state assistance.

In their lawsuit, Jakob Finci, a Jew, and Dervo Sejdic, a Roma, claimed Bosnia’s constitution violated the European Convention on Human Rights by limiting their rights as members of ethnic minorities to sit in parliament or hold other top state offices.

Under Bosnia’s 1995 constitution, these positions are limited to members of the country’s three so-called constituent nations, Bosniaks [Muslims], Serbs and Croats.

In the case of the law on a census, the Republika Srpska President said all political leaders were ready to get this issue off the table but no final agreement had been reached “owing to the issue of the establishment of Council of Ministers”.

Bosnia has been unable to form a new state-level government since October 2010 general elections ended in stalemate.

“The circumstances are even more complex now for an agreement [on a Council of Ministers] but if we were to put European issues on a separate agenda then it would be discussed in a relaxed atmosphere,” Dodik continued.

Although he had earlier called for a reduction in the size of the state budget, the Bosnian Serb leader said he was now ready to accept a budgetary framework based on last year’s spending levels.

EU envoy Sorensen said European ministers had taken note of everything Bosnia had done in terms of adopting a law on state assistance “as well as efforts to implement the Sejdic-Finci ruling but they had also concluded that there was enough talk and now was the time for action.

“I came with a clear message from European Ministers stating that the EU was worried because of delays occurring in BiH,” he added.

“All this leads us to appeal to political leaders in this country to form the Council of Ministers as soon as possible,” he concluded.