Scant Hopes For New Round of Bosnia Talks

Talks on forming a government in Bosnia, which has not had a state government for almost a year since the October 2010 elections, are to resume in Sarajevo today.

But while leaders of the six main parliamentary parties have been holding hasty inter-party talks, few observers of Bosnia's tangled political scene expect a breakthrough any time soon.

The leader of Social Democratic Party, SDP, Zlatko Lagumdzija, held fruitless meetings with the leaders of the two strongest Croatian parties, the Croatian Democratic Union, HDZ, and Croatian Democratic Union, HDZ 1990 on Wednesday.

The SDP leader told the two Croat party leaders, Dragan Covic and Bozo Ljubic, that the SDP would not back down on its demands concerning the distribution of posts in the Council of Ministers, the executive branch of the state government.

However, the Croatian parties also believe that the same coveted ministerial positions belong to them. Like the SDP, they want the position of chair of the Council of Ministers chairman, or the post of state prime minister.

The Croatian position is supported by the strongest Bosnian Serb party, the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats, SNSD, led by Milorad Dodik.

With no agreement on this core issue in sight, no major change is expected on Thursday in Sarajevo.

According to the executive secretary of Dodik's SNSD, Rajko Vasic, "There is little possibility of the formation of the Council of Ministers. There is no indication that something is changing."

But the HDZ leader, Covic, said he still believed the Sarajevo meeting could result in an agreement on matters related to Bosnia's EU ambitions, such as changes to the constitution, agreement on a census and a law on state aid.

"I think that there is a chance that we will agree on these laws on Thursday. But when it comes to the Council of Ministers I don't think that we will reach an agreement," Covic said.

"However, by the time we have the next meeting in Banja Luka, which some of the Serbian parties will host, it would be realistic to agree on that too," Covic added.

In the absence of a new Council of Ministers, the old state government has continued working under technical mandate since October last year.