THEIR CLOSETS FULL OF SKELETON! Serbian member of B&H Presidency Željka Cvijanović for Kurir on Sarajevo’s treatment of Srpska!

The demands of the Sarajevo officials that NATO deploy its forces in the Brčko District are made nearly every day. The Serbian member of the B&H Presidency Željka Cvijanović has called these demands pointless, underlining the fact that all the problems in B&H are solely political in nature. In the interview of the week with Kurir, she also spoke about the letter of the UN Secretary General, the status of the High Representative in B&H, and the relations between Serbia and the Republic of Srpska.

“The demands that NATO deploy its forces are pointless demands made by shallow politicians who aim to attract the attention of the international actors by stories of the allegedly compromised security situation. All the problems in B&H are solely political in nature, not security-related, so that it makes no sense to even discuss this, let alone request the deployment of additional forces in B&H. At any rate, the messages of all the relevant actors, such as EUFOR and NATO, testify to that as their assessments are that the security situation in B&H is stable. Incidentally, I think these are tendentious requests, most often made by Sarajevo, aimed at representing the Republic of Srpska as a factor of disruption. They keep doing it, while their Sarajevo closets are full of skeletons. It is also a sort of escape from an internal dialogue on their part, which, unlike additional foreign troops, is the only thing that can contribute to resolving the open political questions in B&H.”

What can the Republic of Srpska expect from the session of the B&H Parliamentary Assembly’s House of Representatives, scheduled for 22 August, and will allocating the seats in the Council of Ministers resolve the ongoing institutional crisis?

“Allocating the seats in the Council of Ministers is an obligation following from the agreement with the partners from the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and not any sort of concession to the Republic of Srpska. At any rate, the obligation regarding the equal representation of the constituent nations in the Council of Ministers is prescribed as well, so things are clear in that respect. That said, I think it is a positive signal that we have reached a certain agreement about appointing the Minister of Finance from the ranks of the Serbian nation, adopting several laws which are important for making progress on the B&H’s European path, and, of course, setting up a working group whose work should result in the reform of the B&H Constitutional Court and the resolution of the current crisis. I expect that we continue to talk about all the important topics and resolve the issues of interest for all the nations that we represent in the institutions.”

Will the B&H Constitutional Court crisis be resolved? As a reminder, the court in question has changed the rules pertaining to its operation, allowing it to now operate without Serbian judges. What is the way out of this situation?

“The Republic of Srpska is not responsible for the crisis that has arisen by making unconstitutional and illegal decisions on the part of the Constitutional Court, so the key for its resolution is not in our hands, but in someone else’s. We are certainly ready to make a contribution to its resolution, but the ball is in the Sarajevo actors’ court. We have made it clear that this Constitutional Court, in which three foreign nationals and the representatives of a single nation keep making unconstitutional decisions to the detriment of the Republic of Srpska, is not acceptable to us. At any rate, its reform is also one of the demands of the European Union, because it is not a normal state of affairs that any country in the 21^st century – and especially a candidate for EU membership – tolerates foreign nationals making any decisions in its institutions. This is a remnant of times long gone by, centuries even, and I think that it is high time we finally stepped out of that semi-colonial position.”

On Dodik’s announcement of a referendum

‘All political and legal means to protect the Republic of Srpska’

The President of the Republic of Srpska Milorad Dodik has announced on his Twitter account a referendum on the secession of the Republic of Srpska by the end of the year. Do you think that the referendum will be held within that deadline? What would it mean for the Republic of Srpska if the citizens vote in favour of secession?

“When you talk about the announcements of the referendum on the status, and not the secession of the Republic of Srpska, then it is very important to contextualize things. Such announcements are always a response to certain processes which grossly violate the Dayton and constitutional position of the Republic of Srpska within B&H. We cannot and will never accept the process of tacit centralization of B&H because we did not agree to that in Dayton. We are legalists and stand for what the Constitution and the Dayton Peace Agreement say. Therefore, the responsibility does not lie with us, but with those who want to illegally disrupt the agreement that took a lot of effort to make, as well as the balance between the three constituent nations. We will always oppose such attempts, and we will use all the political and legal means to protect the constitutional position of the Republic of Srpska.”

Do you think that the authorities at the level of B&H will resolve the 14 priorities necessary to join the EU, given that one of the priorities includes a mandatory reform of the B&H Constitutional Court and regulating the issue of the departure of foreign national judges?

“We have proposed to the partners from the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina to open the process of resolving all the 14 priorities in parallel, although there are some among them that are very complex from the standpoint of the Republic of Srpska. I think it is a fair proposal, both to them and to the European Union. If we are ready to open some of the topics that are difficult for us, then we expect the same from the partners from the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is encouraging that we have made a principled agreement about the Constitutional Court, but it is yet to implemented in practice. This is certainly one of the most important questions for us in the Republic of Srpska, and I believe for the entire B&H, as this is an institution which – alongside the Office of the High Representative – has been the greatest generator of political and institutional crises in B&H in the past decade.”

How do you comment on the letter of the UN Secretary General António Guterres saying that the UN has no authority to appoint the B&H High Representative? What is the fate of the decisions made by the High Representative?

“The first thing that must be pointed out is that B&H does not have the High Representative at the present moment, as confirmed indirectly by Guterres himself in his response to my letter. The Dayton Agreement clearly stipulates the procedure of appointing high representatives, and this procedure has not been followed as, unlike with his predecessors, in the case of Christian Schmidt, there is no relevant resolution of the UN Security Council. Therefore, the National Assembly of the Republic of Srpska noted that fact, defending the international law. As for Guterres’s letter, he has actually said it all by avoiding to directly answer my question. I asked him to provide me with the decision of the Security Council regarding the appointment of Christian Schmidt, and he referred me to the Security Council database which contains individual resolutions on the appointments of high representatives from Dayton until now, but not the resolution which appoints Schmidt. Now, if this does not fall under the authority of the Security Council, a question can be raised as to why they had been appointing high representatives until now. Incidentally, we in the Republic of Srpska are lectured every day about how we must abide by the decisions of the Constitutional Court, and even that institution established in its decision from 2006 that high representatives are verified by the Security Council. Incidentally, I had seen at least three versions of Guterres’s letter in the media before it was delivered to me, which is scandalous. Of those three versions, two were forgeries, in which a non-existent word had been inserted in the middle of Guterres’s sentence, considerably changing the context of the entire letter. The letter was handed to me only after at a press conference I listed the laws that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs had violated by delivering the letter to the media, whose reports contained the fabrications, but not to me – the intended recipient. All this speaks to usurping the MFA and the B&H diplomatic and consular network by Bosniak personnel, as well as the habitual manipulations of this personnel and their supporting news services, which are even capable of forging a letter of the UN Secretary General. Naturally, I went to the relevant institutions as well.”

What is your assessment of the ties between the Republic of Serbia and the Republic of Srpska? Where is the room for improving the cooperation?

“The ties between Serbia and the Republic of Srpska are excellent. We will confirm this again next week, when we in the Republic of Srpska will have the opportunity to welcome a delegation from Serbia which will consist of the entire government and be headed by President Aleksandar Vučić. A range of activities and meetings are planned, including a joint session of the governments of Serbia and Srpska in Banjaluka, as well as marking the anniversary of the suffering of the Serbs during the criminal Operation Storm action, to be held in Prijedor this year. It was presidents Vučić and Dodik who have established the practice of jointly marking important national events from the past, thus also reflecting unity regarding our shared past, as much as our present and our future. We are very proud of our brotherly relations and the cooperation with Serbia, which has never been better, richer, and more concrete. I am convinced that the upcoming visit will further the trend of strengthening our ties, and that one of the topics will certainly be the implementation of joint energy and infrastructural projects. Some of these projects are still being obstructed in various ways by Sarajevo, but I am sure that their implementation would harm no one, but would instead bring multiple benefits to everyone in Serbia and the Republic of Srpska, and, by extension, all of B&H. However, some people in Sarajevo are so blinded by their hatred towards the Republic of Srpska and Serbia that they cannot see beyond their noses. Of course, this cannot and will not affect our willingness to develop our relations even more intensively, because what brings together the Republic of Srpska and Serbia is the most natural of ties.”

Zoran Simonović