Denis's Guarantees Expired: The End of EUFOR(ia)!

By: Avdo Avdić/Istraga

Things stand like this: Milorad Dodik was convicted for not respecting the OHR's decisions. He was not convicted for not respecting the decisions of BiH institutions. And now this same OHR, because of which Milorad Dodik was convicted, says it will not suspend Dodik's laws that are undermining BiH institutions.

In this way, the guarantees that the Bosniak member of the Presidency, Denis Bećirović, brought to the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina after arduous and meaningless meetings, have expired. Just two headlines on the Klix portal, published within an hour, showed the futility of Bećirović's entire policy, which gives the Bosniak people false hope that someone from the outside will defend the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The first headline reads: "Bećirović after the meeting (with ambassadors): The international community will not tolerate attempts to violate the Dayton Peace Agreement".

The second headline, published an hour later, reads: "PIC condemned the decisions of the National Assembly of Republika Srpska: Use domestic instruments to protect the BiH Constitution".

In short, Denis's guarantees have expired. If they ever existed. Does anyone remember this sentence by Lord David Owen, spoken at a time when the eyes of Bosnians and Herzegovinians were turned to the West, at a time when Serbia (and later Croatia) was carrying out aggression against BiH?

"Don't, don't, don't live under this dream that the West is going to come and sort this problem out. Don't dream dreams".

- Don't, Lord Owen repeated several times, dream that the West will come and solve the problems in BiH.

- Don't dream dreams - Owen repeated.

To be honest, the West did react a few years later. It did not react during the genocide in Srebrenica. It reacted at the moment when the great offensive of the Army of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina began in the Krajina region.

Thirty years later, peace in BiH is threatened. Foreigners are sending a message similar to that of Lord David Owen.

"Members of the Peace Implementation Council (PIC) further emphasize the importance of using all domestic legal remedies to preserve the constitutional order of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Leaders should fully focus their energy on achieving progress, including the path towards the European Union, with all its benefits for the citizens of BiH," the West is sending a message.

Or, translated into English: "Don't, don't, don't live under this dream that the West is going to come and sort this problem out. Don't dream dreams".

At a time when the world order is falling apart, the Minister of Foreign Affairs is visiting studios of Sarajevo television, and the Bosniak member of the Presidency, thus the supreme commander of the Armed Forces of BiH, is seeking help from "neutral EUFOR" and the "international community" which, immediately after the meeting, tells him: "Don't dream dreams".

EUFOR(ia) is over. Let's face the truth. The US State Department did NOT welcome the verdict against Milorad Dodik. The US State Department "took note" of the verdict.

"We take note of today's verdict by the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina against the President of Republika Srpska, Milorad Dodik," said State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce.

Nowhere did Tammy write that the State "supports the verdict". "We acknowledge" can mean many things, but it never means "we support" or "we welcome".

Here is a comparison. When the first-instance verdict against the Prime Minister of the Federation of BiH, Fadil Novalić, was announced on April 5, it was stated by the US Embassy, ​​certainly not without the approval of the State Department:

"The United States strongly supports independent and courageous institutions that enforce laws, prosecutors' offices, and judicial institutions that work on behalf of the citizens of this country to investigate, prosecute, and punish corruption in order to investigate, prosecute, and punish corruption that burdens the democracy and economy of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which encourages numerous citizens of this country to leave it and build lives for themselves and their families elsewhere.

Study after study and data after data show how citizens do not trust these institutions, and corruption is getting worse. We have always called on judicial institutions to hold the powerful accountable".

Anyone who does not see the difference between these two statements published after the first-instance verdict against Novalić and the first-instance verdict against Dodik will surely believe in those expired guarantees that Denis Bećirović collected for months.

So, the OHR says: "Don't dream dreams". The PIC says that BiH institutions must solve the problem known as Dodik's laws, which effectively carry out a coup d'état.

On the OHR website, you can, for example, find that the Office of the High Representative has suspended the application of the Law on Immovable Property of Republika Srpska. BiH institutions existed then too, but the OHR decided to react, without waiting for the decision of the Constitutional Court of BiH.

Why was the principle that the PIC is now proposing, that BiH institutions should resolve this issue, not applied then? The answer is simple - because Michael Murphy, a retired US ambassador, was sitting in the PIC at the time.

Not so long ago, the OHR took over the role of BiH institutions. And now, when Milorad Dodik is attacking BiH institutions precisely because of the OHR, the OHR says - let BiH institutions fight it out themselves.

Do you remember the decisions of the Constitutional Court of BiH that prohibited the celebration of the Day of Republika Srpska? For at least five years in a row, the authorities of Republika Srpska have violated the decision of the Constitutional Court of BiH.

The BiH Prosecutor's Office has never filed an indictment (except when they indicted the wrong people, and the BiH Court was eager to refuse to confirm it) against any official of Republika Srpska for this. Michael Murphy was not so agile in pressuring the BiH Prosecutor's Office to indict the RS authorities for not implementing the decisions of the BiH Constitutional Court, even though it was a criminal offense.

Then Schmidt amended the Criminal Code of BiH and introduced the criminal offense of not respecting OHR decisions. The BiH Prosecutor's Office, under pressure from foreigners, indicted Dodik for this criminal offense, although, on many grounds, it could have indicted him for not implementing the decisions of the "domestic institution" called the BiH Constitutional Court.

The BiH Court had no choice but to convict Dodik based on the valid law. Dodik retaliated with laws that undermine the BiH Court, the BiH Prosecutor's Office, and the entire state judiciary.

What are the foreigners doing? They are calling on domestic institutions to deal with Dodik.

Can they? Yes. Because domestic institutions saved the "OHR" with the verdict against Dodik. Even though the OHR has a mandate to save BiH institutions.