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BOSNIA: NO AGREEMENT ON NEW CONSTITUTION

Brussels, 14 Nov. (AKI) - The leaders of eight Bosnian political parties have failed to come to an agreement on the country’s new constitution, after a three-day meeting in Brussels, sponsored by the European Union and the United States. The representatives of Bosnia’s three nationalities, Bosniacs (Muslims), Serbs and Croats, agreed to disagree and to continue negotiations next week in Washington.

The meeting was initiated by the high representative of the international community in Bosnia, British diplomat Paddy Ashdown, who claims that Bosnia’s present constitution is not functional and hamper’s the country’s drive to join EU.

Ashdown, whose four-year term runs out in a few months, has said that the present constitution, forged at the Dayton peace conference that ended Bosnian civil war in 1995, should be modernised to bring Bosnia closer to the standards of a “normal and functional state”. Under the Dayton accord, Bosnia was divided into two entities - a Muslim-Croat federation and a Serb entity, Republika Srpska (RS), with all state attributes, including parliament, government, army and police.

Ashdown has gradually stripped entities of some state prerogatives, paving the way for a unified army and police on a state level. Instead of the current rotating three-man state presidency, Ashdown has proposed a single president, prime minister and parliament president, which would be shared by the three nationalities.

Serbian press has reported that U.S. experts had worked “secretly for seven months on the draft of a new constitution, which was rejected in Brussels today. Fearful of Muslim domination, Serbs insist on retaining Republika Srpska, with slight modifications, while Croats have stepped up demands for their own entity.

RS president Dragan Cavic said that the Serb entity was ready to contribute to better functioning of Bosnia-Herzegovina, but not “to commit constitutional suicide”. In his words, some politicians in Muslim-Croat federation “don’t want the evolution” of the present system, “but a revolution”.

“There were people here who don’t want to find a solution, because they are counting on the pressure from the international community,” said Cavic.
Muslim member of the state presidency Sulejman Tihic supported the new constitutional proposal, saying that the “central state institutions should be strengthened for the sake of Euro-Atlantic integrations”. He rejected a proposal by his Croat colleague in the presidency, Dragan Covic, that a third entity should be formed. Serbs, on the other hand, have nothing against Croat entity as long as RS remains intact.

Foreign minister Mladen Ivanic, a Serb, nevertheless expressed the hope that the three sides would come closer to an agreement at a meeting in Washington next week, marking 10th anniversary of the Dayton agreement, which will be hosted by the U.S. secretary of state Condoleezza Rice.

American diplomat Donald Hayes, who chaired the Brussels meeting, said some progress has been made. “Concretely, the central government in Sarajevo has to be responsible for the talks with the European Union on an agreement on Stabilisation and Association,” said Hayes. He added that the talks on constitutional changes were dictated not by the Dayton anniversary but by the fact that there will be elections in Bosnia next year,

Hayes underlined that the three Bosnian parties would have to come to an agreement in the country’s best interest, and “no one from outside can impose the changes”.

(Vpr/Aki)
14-Nov-05

Croatian American Association
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