Komšić: We carry the flag of freedom, enemies and false friends will break us, but in vain

(Patria) - Members of the Presidency of BiH Željko Komšić and Denis Bećirović hosted a reception tonight at the Sarajevo City Hall on the occasion of the Statehood Day of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

In his address, Komšić first greeted all present, especially members of the Mountain Rescue Service and the Federal Civil Protection Administration, as well as athletes Ismail Barlov and Lejla Njemčević, who also attended the reception.

Greetings and congratulations were also extended to the basketball national team of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Read below what Željko Komšić said in his address tonight.

"On November 25, 1943, in the conditions of Nazi occupation and quisling terror, the citizens and peoples of Bosnia and Herzegovina, led by the National Liberation Movement, which consisted of various groups of democratically oriented citizens, managed to restore the statehood of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

It was a historic success that many who fell in the fight against the occupiers and traitors did not have the fortune to experience, nor did those who, in the decades preceding it, made a significant contribution to preserving the idea of Bosnia and Herzegovina as an independent and sovereign state, through the political struggle for the autonomy of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Their dreams of an autonomous status for Bosnia and Herzegovina, both in relation to the empires from the East and the empires from the West, and in relation to political Belgrade and political Zagreb, were fulfilled by the fighters of the National Liberation Movement by constituting the Republic with ZAVNOBiH, with Sarajevo as its capital.

The historical breakthrough that was thus made was not only the fulfillment of the idea of an autonomous position for Bosnia and Herzegovina, but also a pledge for the future and a guidepost on the path to independence and sovereignty.

November twenty-fifth is nothing other than the birthplace of March first. These are the foundations of the statehood and independence of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Although it sometimes seems, and perhaps too often, raises a dilemma about whether these foundations are sufficient for the survival and progress of Bosnia and Herzegovina, today, at this solemn moment, it should be emphasized that many empires, states, and pseudo-states have disappeared, while Bosnia and Herzegovina has survived!

It has not been blown away by numerous geopolitical storms precisely because of the foundations that form its framework. Therefore, we must value what we have more, because nothing we have is accidental.

New geopolitical storms will surely blow, and we who love this country, or the generations that come after us, will have some kind of shelter. It depends on us whether we will, how and in what way, on our foundations, secure it for what the future holds.


Photo: Patria

We cannot and should not expect anyone else but us here to establish and improve the state framework we possess. We must be the ones to strengthen the supporting pillars of our statehood on the eve of challenges that will surely not bypass us.

Valuing what we have, with an awareness of the reality in which we live, I am convinced that we will continue to pursue the idea of Bosnia and Herzegovina in such a way that we will never give up on the idea that this country should be a state of all its citizens, that we will continue the fight for this idea, which is not decades-old, but centuries-old.

The citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina today, before European courts, carry the same flag of freedom that the partisans carried in 1943, and that the fighters of the Army of the Republic of BiH and the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina carried. And that struggle itself is again, like that, I would say, a partisan struggle.

We have no funds, nor bags of money with which to buy justice, although in the world as it is, we should have them too. We have none of that political corruption and lack of principle that subordinates all morality to interest, although in the world as it is, we should have it too.

In general, as citizens who want a normal state, we have very little that makes us strong, but I am convinced that, no matter how some processes end in which the possibility of Bosnia and Herzegovina as a normal civic state is called into question, there will always be someone who will continue the fight to final victory.

Finally, I want to emphasize that any future struggle for Bosnia and Herzegovina will depend on how much strength and knowledge we gather. Bosnia and Herzegovina can be proud of the people it has produced in the past 81 years since ZAVNOBiH. These people, with their strength and acquired knowledge, have preserved the state framework we possess.

And one more message. A message to those who deny the statehood, but also the independence of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is all in vain! This country, on November 25, 1943, after several centuries, restored its statehood. On March 1, 1992, it gained its independence.

For centuries, they trampled, burned, destroyed, devastated it, both the land and our way of life, but they did not succeed.

It sometimes seemed that they had inflicted irreparable damage on us. It seemed that every generation of our people had to confront evil at least once in their lives and had no other choice but to oppose it with all their might.

There is no doubt, as things stand now, that they will continue to try, both our enemies and our false friends. Our country, in the emerging world, will be exposed to pressures and challenges, they will break us, they will demand that we bend our backs, they will blackmail us arrogantly and insolently, they will use everything they can just to divide us, but we will not give up our statehood and independence.

There is no giving up on Bosnia and Herzegovina! Long live our only, our Bosnia and Herzegovina!

I wish all citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina a happy Statehood Day."