By Apostolis Fotiadis
SARAJEVO, Apr 7 2008 (IPS)

Kosovo’s unilateral declaration of independence has provoked new divisions in Bosnia and Herzegovina over the past few weeks.

Demonstrations organised by ethnic Serbs since the proclamation of Kosovo independence Feb. 17 have continued since, and occasionally resulted in small riots.

Bosnian-Serb politicians, including Milorad Dodik, Prime Minister of Republica Srpska, the autonomous Serbian entity, have threatened to hold a referendum on Serbian independence within Bosnia.

Since the Dayton agreement of November 1995 that brought an end to the war in Bosnia, the country has remained deeply divided along ethnic lines.

Bosnia is today separated into two political entities – the Federation mostly inhabited by Croats and Muslim Bosniaks, and Republica Srpska (RS) which hosts the majority of Serbs in the country.

The three ethnic groups are separated even when they live in the same environment, as in Mostar southwest of Sarajevo, where Croats and Bosniaks live next to one another without sharing anything.

The Chair of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina rotates among three members who originate from the three ethnic groups, each elected for an eight-month term within their four-year term as a member. Members of the Presidency are elected directly by the people.

Political representatives meet in the Council of the Ministers, which runs the central governmental institutions.

Political and legislative processes in Bosnia are supervised by the international community’s Higher Representative (HR) that has the power to block or impose legislation, and to dismiss elected or non-elected officials.

People speak of the HR as the ‘little god of Bosnia’.

This arrangement has brought Catholic Croatians, Muslim Bosniaks and Orthodox Christian Serbs to live in the same country – but in separate worlds within it.

Complicated institutional arrangements have been put in place in order to preserve the sensitive balance necessary for this co-existence. Today the country hosts three telecommunication systems, three transportation networks, and three educational systems. But the entities accept the local Mark as common currency.

Sixty percent of Bosnia’s budget is spent on preserving its complicated administrative system. But the arrangements, as the recent turbulence shows, may not necessarily be proof against Bosnia’s partition.

“By associating their politics with what happens in Kosovo, radicals in RS stress that if Kosovo becomes independent, then they could become independent,” Jovan Divjak, the highest ranking ethnic Serb officer in the Bosnian army who fought against his ethnic kin during the war in Bosnia told IPS.

“After Dayton I thought there would be some kind of agreement among the people who suffered. But people are not less separated now than they were just after the war. The fact is that people who were responsible for the wars here still have power in their hands.

“Many of them have not given up their ideas of Greater Serbia, and I can’t see any intention among them to establish relations of tolerance. They have no hesitation about it; step by step they are moving towards their target. On the other hand the idea of a 100 percent Bosnia and Herzegovina (with limited or without ethnic autonomy for Serbs) promoted by Muslim politicians indicates that not everyone is on good terms with the idea of RS’s existence.”

Recent attempts to centralise power by transferring authority, especially over uniformed officials, from the ethnic entities to the state level has become a new source of tension.

Serbian politicians are resisting the pressure. Dodik has refused any centralisation of police forces, and has asked for demilitarisation of Bosnia in order to effectively cancel any role for the newborn centralised Bosnian army.

“Serbs are happy with what they have, and can live with current divisions,” Sasa Bizic, deputy editor of the political magazine New Reporter published in Banja Luka told IPS. Banja Luka is the capital of RS.

“They are aware that Muslim politicians promote unification because they want to control everything. But RS is not going to melt into Bosnia. It can only stay as it is, with its own separate institutions. Serbs will not peacefully accept anything else.”

But Bizic said talk of partition of Bosnia is not realistic. “Another five to ten years are necessary before the situation clears. Serbs’ desire for independence is not a result of ethnic hatred but of tiredness with unification pressures.”

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