Cero: Towards the Session of the Peace Implementation Council Steering Board

By Muharem Cero

Whether the Dayton provision on the right to parallel special relations between entities under the Dayton arrangements will survive the conclusions of the "All-Serbian Assembly" Declaration will largely determine the future position of the statehood and political subjectivity of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

More or less simultaneously with the constitutionally questionable rise to power in the RS entity of Milorad Dodik, and the then-recognized breeze of social democratic ideological-political provenance, the "lobbying agenda of a fabricated state" entered political action.

The tools of a distorted Dayton perception have not been corrected for almost two decades, nor have they been corrected by those responsible, creating the impression of correctness and political appropriateness in the interpretation of the Dayton Peace Agreement.

And so it went until the "All-Serbian Declaration." It is superfluous now to search for where the agenda of a "fabricated state" originated and who its creator is, although it is not unimportant, one must bear and respond to the latest attempt at its realization.

It is certain only that it was meticulously designed for a targeted context, which, according to its creators and executors, has now been created.

The entire construct of the 49 conclusions of the declaration rests on the agenda of a fabricated state. It is no longer just a tool but the ultimate goal; the model of assembling BiH statehood is being dismantled in the opposite direction.

Although it is not an extraordinary, but a regular six-month meeting of the Steering Board of the Peace Implementation Council (PIC) in BiH (read: the Quint and associates), it will take place in significantly changed circumstances of implementing and maintaining peace in Bosnia.
In the form of holding the Belgrade Assembly, the justification invokes Dayton law on parallel special relations and their constitutional-legal consummation.

The justification that the declaration's conclusions fall within the permissible scope of Article 3 of the Dayton Peace Agreement and the right to parallel special relations of entities with neighboring countries, including the RS, is not valid.

The right to parallel relations is limited by Dayton in three ways. Such relations cannot, under any circumstances, infringe upon the sovereignty or territorial integrity of the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina, nor can they be discriminatory.

Let's go in reverse order, as perhaps the most flagrant violation of this right. With the content of the conclusions, the spirit and letter of the declaration, as well as the accompanying narrative of its proponents, the other two equally constituent factors in the entity cannot identify themselves.

First and foremost, Bosniaks, and with a slight question, Croats as well (for which we await their own response, which has not yet come). The constitutional fact of the constitutionality of all on the entire territory is unquestionable by the decision of the Constitutional Court of BiH in case V/58, proposed by the plaintiff for constitutional review, the late Alija Izetbegović.

Only a closer reading of the declaration's conclusions reveals that the proponents perceive the RS entity arrangement as a Serbian exclusivity, with the words 'Serbs and other citizens of the RS,' which is the basic construct of a fabricated state cloaked in the guise of 'original Dayton.'

Many unconstitutional deceptions could be listed in almost all 49 conclusions of the declaration, but that is the subject matter of another piece, on which the members of the Steering Board of the PIC should provide an assessment, precisely at their regular meeting on June 19 and 20 in Sarajevo.

The other two limitations on the right to parallel relations concerning the violation of BiH's sovereignty and territorial integrity are already a continuity of political action originating from Belgrade academic circles, operationalized in Banja Luka's transactional narratives proven by the clamor of supporters.

An almost notorious matter, mildly disputed, softly criminally prosecuted, internationally neglected, and in the internal political mentality of compromise, incapable of recognizing the difference between compromise and compromise-making itself.

If the declaration survives the Dayton right to parallel special relations to an extent that contradicts the constitutional limits of what is permissible, only one thing is certain. This survival in favor of the declaration means one thing - Bosnia and Herzegovina will certainly not survive, with an unpredictable timeline for its disappearance in the process of implementing the declaration's conclusions.

All these questions should and must be answered by the members of the Peace Implementation Council in BiH, whom we are approaching. The absence of a reaction and the failure to suspend the right to parallel special relations of the RS and Serbia until the content of the declaration is harmonized with the actual rights guaranteed by Dayton would mean complicity in the sinister project of creating a new normality, as Zahrova promised us.