Dr Hadzidedic: Covic's retrograde politics is supported by some international circles

The International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY) rendered its final judgement in the case Prlic et al. affirming the sentences for the former leaders of self-proclaimed Croat statelet 'Herceg-Bosna' for the crimes against humanity, violations of the laws or customs of war, and grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions. The president of HDZ BiH, Dragan Covic, condemned the verdict, referring to it as 'criminal'.

Some analysists believe that such reaction may give birth to certain consequences for Covic.

The ICTY, the one that Covic calls 'criminal', is an international court established in May 1993 by the United Nations as a response to mass crimes taking place in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina at the time. By calling its verdicts 'criminal', Covic sends a clear message that he has the same opinion about this court.

Professor Zlatko Hadzidedic, the international relations expert, does not envisage Covic encountering any consequences for his behavior, which Hadzidedic considers – hypocritical.

Asked if he expected any response by the international community to the Covic's insulting the UN court, Hadzidedic asserted that 'there's no international community' and questioned if it ever existed after all.

- The question is, if, what we used to refer to as the 'international community', ever really acted in unison, Hadzidedic told us. He reminded us of the 1990's when 'the UK was running one policy together with France, then there was the United States with a different policy, then France with another president joined the US, ending up on the opposite side from the UK'.

Hadzidedic also recalled Russia not knowing where to position itself as it was in a difficult economic situation back then.

- We used to call all of that 'the international community', however, it was a delusion. It was always about the interests of certain countries attempting to take advantage of the illusion of the international community in order to propell their own aspirations, Hadzidedic explains, adding that perhaps only Germany and France, as important countries, could claim to be acting on behalf of the EU.

He further stated that, the world has reached the stage of stratification, when the countries, big powers in particular, tend to take new positions, each one trying to take the most favorable position for itself.

- I'm not one of those who believe that, by his rhetoric, Mr. Covic is merely trying to homogenize its electoral body, but that he actually has some support from abroad for what he has been doing, Hadzidedic maintains, adding that, what he says does not only apply to Covic, but also some other politicians in the country with similar retrograde policies. 'Most probably, such politicians get the support intended to destabilize the overall situation in BiH, consequently in the region, creating eventually an unbearable situation which would create some sort of illusion... the conflict in the Balkans or new divisions as a way to avoid it.