What would Ivanić and Vučić do in Izetbegović's place

We have witnessed one of the most absurd situations in Bosnia and Herzegovina in the last ten days, writes Patria.   

Those who have been persistently denying state institutions and their decisions since September last year, paying 30 million dollars to lobbying firms in the US to undermine BiH, organizing unconstitutional referendums, deploying members of the BiH Armed Forces on their own initiative... are today presenting themselves as staunch protectors of the state and its institutions.

From Mladen Ivanić, through Milorad Dodik to Nedeljko Čubrilović, they are all citing the BiH Constitution. Absurd and an insult to the intelligence of all citizens in this country!

The same Ivanić who admitted that Dodik forced him to illegally deploy the army to the streets, because otherwise he would be called a traitor to the Serbian people, today, perhaps forgetting what he himself did, said:

- How far will the sycophancy towards one's own environment go? In BiH, decision-making by the will of only one nation cannot happen.

Did Ivanić ask Dodik this question when he organized the unconstitutional referendum on September 25, or did he, as the Chairman of the BiH Presidency (a sovereign president, as he would say himself), call on citizens in Republika Srpska to vote?

He did it himself, thereby violating the decision of the BiH Constitutional Court, for which an investigation has been opened by the BiH Prosecutor's Office, and he is one of the suspects.

Ivanić did not shy away from appeasing his own environment on January 9, and without the consent of Bakir Izetbegović, and with the expected silence of Dragan Čović, as one-third of the supreme commander, he deployed "his third" of the BiH Armed Forces members to Banja Luka's Trg Krajine.

Ivanić, who is considered an extremely cunning and pragmatic politician, consciously violated the Constitution of this country, of which he is the head, because he did not want to bear the epithet of a traitor to his people.

Why, then, should Izetbegović bear the epithet of a traitor to this state, to Bosniaks as the greatest victims, without diminishing the significance, and to the victims of other nations in this country?

If, by chance, the situation were reversed, what would Ivanić do? How would Vučić act? 

And why all the fuss from politicians from Republika Srpska, which is an integral part of a state that survived aggression and genocide?

What is happening now is only an expected continuation of the 24-year-long path to justice and truth, which the victims expect. The decision to file a request for a review of the verdict is no surprise. What response the International Court of Justice in The Hague will give remains to be seen. Perhaps it will reject the request for review at the very beginning, or perhaps the procedure will be carried out to the end.

No one knows the outcome at this moment, but Ivanić and Dodik, aided by Aleksandar Vučić and Tomislav Nikolić, were quick to blame Izetbegović for everything. For creating instability in the region and for moving away from reconciliation.

Can true and sincere reconciliation be achieved at all if one does not want to admit that a regime led by Slobodan Milošević committed aggression and genocide in BiH?

Only the truth about the events of the bloody war years can be the only correct path to reconciliation.

If Serbia, today's Europe-oriented Serbia, had enough strength and courage to adopt a resolution on the committed genocide in Srebrenica, if it had instructed politicians from RS to adopt a law on the denial of genocide in the BiH Parliament, and if it had done the same in its own country, if Russia had not vetoed the British resolution on Srebrenica in the UN Security Council two years ago, the situation in these areas would certainly be different today.

Much would be different if Vučić had not spent his energy two years ago lobbying against the British resolution, but had directed it towards his country and citizens to open their eyes and show them the true truth about the war in BiH and Serbia's participation in it. Much would be different if Serbia had confronted all the criminals who stained their hands in BiH and are walking freely today in Belgrade and other cities. 

With all these moves, Serbia would show that it is truly ready for genuine and sincere reconciliation, not the kind that Vučić continuously talks about for the sake of form.

How would a great Germany have recovered after World War II and become what it is today if it hadn't been for the Nuremberg trials and the great Willy Brandt? During one of his visits to Poland, he knelt before the monument to Polish victims of Nazism.

That way of apologizing on behalf of one's own people for committed crimes has become a standard in the world. With this gesture, Germany honorably admitted its guilt and began to become a truly democratic country.