SURVIVING THE PEACE The Struggle for Postwar Recovery in Bosnia-Herzegovina

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Bosnia update, March 25, 2025
Dodik on trial ~ Unrest in Serbia ~ Dodik attempts secession

Much has happened since my last blog entry, more than four months ago. This extra-long pause took place because I have been feverishly preparing a series of articles on environmental activism in Bosnia-Herzegovina. That writing, based on a visit to Bosnia last fall, follows on my essay that LeftEast published in April of last year. Among other places, in the fall I visited Ozren and Kakanj, which I had written about in the essay. I met dozens of activists and saw the beloved hills, rivers, and valleys that they are trying to defend from international mining companies and domestic plunderers. I have posted an informal journal on that visit here, and the articles should be published soon.

That's why the delay. And you should note that the web site Balkan Witness, curated by my brother Roger, has changed addresses: see https://balkanwitness.org/index.htm. My section in that valuable site, containing writings about Bosnia, Serbia, Kosovo, Ukraine, and beyond, going back more than 25 years, is here: https://balkanwitness.org/journal.htm. Take a look.

Meanwhile, tumultuous events that are the subject of this blog entry have been taking place both in Bosnia and Serbia. Massive, once-in-a-generation protest demonstrations have rocked Serbia since early November 2024. And in Bosnia, Republika Srpska President Dodik has, just since late February, initiated concrete secessionist moves that he has been threatening for the duration of his time in power, all the way back to 2006. Now, he has all but cut ties between the entity that he controls and the Bosnian state. The region is wracked with political tension.

The proximate event that spurred Dodik's current manufactured crisis was his year-long trial for violating laws decreed by High Representative Christian Schmidt nearly two years ago. This blog entry will start by describing what led to that trial, and its outcome. After that I'll discuss events in Serbia, and end with a description of Dodik's ongoing attempt to separate the Serb-controlled entity from Bosnia-Herzegovina.

This is a crisis in development, so I will only be able to bring you up to date as of today. We'll see what happens next. I apologize for the length of this entry, but that has to do with how much news there is!

Dodik on trial

The Office of the High Representative (OHR) is an institution enshrined in the 1995 Dayton agreement that helped bring the war to a close. The High Representative acts as an international governor to ensure that the Dayton peace agreement is implemented.

When the present High Representative, Christian Schmidt, came into office in mid-2021, Dodik and his political associates decided not to recognize his legitimacy, saying that he had not been approved by the UN Security Council. This was a political manipulation and a factual non-sequitur, since UNSC approval is not a prerequisite for the selection of the High Representative. Rather, the Peace Implementation Council, another Dayton institution, is the body that chooses the HR. Regardless of that, Dodik, supported by Russia, continued to use his assertion of the HR's illegitimacy as a pretext to undermine Bosnia's functioning as a state.

This groundless position has been the basis of the conflict between Dodik and the Bosnian state. In mid-2023, President Dodik signed a decree that prohibited the publication in the Republika Srpska of any laws promulgated by the HR. He also decreed as null any decisions found by the state-level Constitutional Court. In response, Schmidt issued a decree making it a crime to fail to publish Bosnian laws in the RS legal gazette; the appearance of a new law in that publication is what brings it into force.

In August of 2023, the state-level prosecutor indicted Dodik for violating state laws, and Miloš Lukić, acting director of the official gazette, for failure to publish the laws that Schmidt had decreed.

The trial began in February of 2024 and carried on, with many interruptions, throughout the year. Each time (approximately monthly) that a hearing took place, Dodik's family and entourage created a spectacle in Sarajevo in front of the courthouse, parking on lawns, displaying banners, chanting, and offering support to their leader.

The prosecution and defense presented their closing statements at the beginning of this year, and the verdict was announced for February 26th. In the tense period leading up to that date, Dodik announced that if he was found guilty, the Republika Srpska would withdraw from the Bosnian state institutions. In Banja Luka there was a meeting of the mayors of most of the RS municipalities, where they pledged to take action if there were a guilty verdict. On the other side, the major opposition parties in the entity avoided support of Dodik, saying things like "Let's not sacrifice our entity for one man."

Dodik announced that the Republika Srpska would withdraw from the army; the State Investigation and Protection Agency (SIPA); the Bosnian Court, the state-level Prosecution; and more state institutions, and that they would seek a confederation with Serbia. A large rally in support of Dodik took place near the entity Parliament building, flanked by armored personnel carriers.

Neither of the defendants attended the end of the trial. Lukić was acquitted, and Dodik was found guilty. He was sentenced to a year in prison and banned from participating in politics for six years. He responded publicly with a barrage of insults laden with vulgar words of language, declaring "the end of Bosnia-Herzegovina as we know it." He reiterated his vow to ban all state-level institutions' presence on Republika Srpska territory.

The next month saw feverish activity on the part of the RS Parliament (NSRS), with rapid deconstruction of the entity's ties to the Bosnian state. As to Dodik's legal status, since the February 26 judgment was a first-instance verdict, it would be customary for him to appeal and, for an indefinite period, walk free pending a binding decision. However, Dodik and his associates chose this time to put into action what he had been threatening for nearly 20 years.

Meanwhile in Serbia

There has not been much in the way of real democratic process in Serbia—ever. There was a short period after Milošević was overthrown in the early part of this century when, a year later, the liberal, West-leaning Zoran Đinđić was elected prime minister. But the dark forces representing the gangster/fascist nexus that had been dominant in Serbia under Milošević assassinated him in 2003, and since then things have gone downhill. This slide has been particularly pronounced in the 12 years of Aleksandar Vučić's rule.

Vučić has long since consolidated his control over the legislature and the media, and has skilfully occupied a position between Russia and the West. The most prominent dissent in the last few years has taken place in opposition to lithium mining; in a way, this has been a springboard for the massive wave of protest that is underway now.

On November 1, a "canopy"—actually a concrete shelter at a railroad station in the northern Serbian city of Novi Sad (where I lived 1981-82) collapsed and killed fifteen people. Protest demonstrations—always observing a 15-minute silence for those who were killed—started nearly immediately in Novi Sad and the capital, Belgrade.

The shelter had recently been repaired as part of a widespread project to update aging infrastructure in many parts of Serbia, with Russian and Chinese contractors carrying out much of the work. In Novi Sad it was a Chinese company that had implemented the repairs, and they had obviously done a quick and dirty job. Serbian government representatives claimed that the Novi Sad station had not been repaired as part of the infrastructure renovation project, and they attributed the failure of the structure to bad work that had been done during the socialist era. But they were caught in the lie, and this only made protestors more angry.

Students have been leading the nearly non-stop demonstrations that are still taking place. They burgeoned until protest events took place in every large and middle-sized city in the country, prominently (in addition to Novi Sad and Belgrade) Kragujevac, Niš, and all the way south to Vranje. Protests accompanied by marches, road blockades, and strikes are being held in dozens of smaller towns as well.

The target of the protests quite quickly broadened as people declared, "This was not an accident, it was murder." Protestors exclaimed that the government had "blood on its hands" for allowing shoddy work to be done, and they quickly identified this problem as a manifestation of the corruption with which they were quite familiar.

The Serbian government failed to conduct an open investigation of the case and ignored the demonstrators' demand to reveal all documents relevant to the restoration projects. For some time no officials were fired, but in the face of ongoing protest, 13 were arrested, and the prime minister of Serbia—a former mayor of Novi Sad—stepped down. Several others, including the Minister of Construction, Transport, and Infrastructure, were fired.

But the students were not satisfied, and their demands escalated. They called for justice for the victims and accountability for those responsible. They demanded that Vučić resign. Participation broadened as the actors' union joined protests, and lawyers held a strike for a period as well.

Tens of thousands demonstrated in Belgrade's main squares in late December, and again on New Year's Eve when, instead of the customary festivities, people gathered to protest in the capital. The demonstrations have largely been peaceful, although there have been some attacks by provocateurs and some arrests. The students added to their demands that the attackers must be prosecuted, and the demonstrators who were arrested must be released.

Vučić, as is his habit, blasted the demonstrators, saying things like, "High school students do not go out on the streets in any other country in the world," and "These traitors [several hundred thousand?] are paid and supported by foreigners who want to take apart Serbia and turn it into a colony." He also accused the political opposition of "using children to further their aims."

Going into the new year, there were solidarity demonstrations in Bosnia, mainly in Sarajevo and Banja Luka, in support of the Serbian students. Bosnian activists took inspiration from the well-organized, sustained action taking place next door. In Banja Luka students held a banner reading, "Same struggle, different city." In one high school in that city, administrators locked the exits and stood by the doors to make sure that no students could leave to participate in protests.

"Official" Banja Luka, as the location of the entity's government, is a center of support for Vučić. The regime even sponsored transportation for students who wished to travel to Serbia to demonstrate in favor of Vučić.

In a trend reminiscent of the Occupy movement in the US, Serbian activists made sure not to drive any leaders into prominence, partly as a measure to prevent targeting of such people, and to underscore the grassroots character of the movement. 

The largest demonstration ever held in Belgrade took place on March 15th, with the slogan "15th for the fifteen [victims]." Despite the government's shutting down the state railroad system and stranding many buses, people arrived in Belgrade by the tens of thousands. Hundreds of bikers, and some dozens of farmers driving tractors, swarmed the capital. Protestors demanded "political responsibility," an end to corruption, the "effective work of state institutions without political influence," and a fair society.

The Serbian government asserted that there were 107,000 participants; on the other hand, the Archive of Public Gatherings reported that there were between 275,000 and 325,000. The protests continue.

Dodik shreds the constitution

Some background: you'll recall that as soon as the current president of the United States was inaugurated in January, he cut off funding to USAID's worldwide operations. Dodik assumed that the new hyper-authoritarian regime in place in the US was naturally going to support his version of autocracy. He strove to march in line with our new leaders, ordering an investigation of USAID practices in the Republika Srpska—even though a greater amount of the $402 million that USAID brought to the RS was allocated to the entity's government agencies than to all RS media outlets and NGOs together. For example, USAID helped with restoration after the massive flooding of 2014; assisted with agricultural development and new highways; and bought scanners for vote-counting in a measure to make elections more fair.

This last item was probably something that rankled the autocratic Dodik and spurred him to praise the trashing of USAID. He thanked the new US president for "liberating the world" and "rehabilitating the meaning of the USA."

In March, shortly after Dodik's conviction, he signed a decree as promised, prohibiting any activity of the Court of Bosnia, the Prosecution, SIPA, the intelligence agency OSA, and the VSTV (High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council) on the territory of the Republika Srpska. He promised to form a VSTV for the RS, and to create a register of all NGOS operating in the entity, with the implication that they may be treated as "foreign agents" if they received funding from abroad.

Dodik also threatened to jail anyone who did not obey the new laws of the RS. One effect of the new laws was to put businesses in the entity in a double bind, because international sanctions required that any transaction over 30,000 KM be reported to SIPA, whereas reporting anything to SIPA, as a state-level agency, would warrant punishment from the RS government.

As tensions were rising, rational Bosnians recognized these moves as a coup and a de facto secession. On the other side, Dodik and his sympathizers nearby and in Serbia fanned the flames, with Dodik saying that "the Bosniaks were always against Dayton...in Sarajevo they want a war, as a manifestation of their decades-long efforts to achieve revenge and to eliminate all Serbs who don't agree with them."

The phony justification of Dodik's secession was that it was the Bosnian state that had violated "original Dayton and the constitution" by transferring capacities from the entities to the state level. Many of the state institutions, it is true, were created in the years after Dayton was signed. But they were created legally, in the state-level parliament, with the participation of Dodik's party. He and his collaborators, however, now say that they are the only advocates for the constitution, and that those who disagree with them are the violators.

Dodik and the RS Ministry of Interior Affairs called on all Serbs who live in the RS and work in SIPA or any other state-level police or intelligence agency to resign, guaranteeing them work in parallel institutions in the RS. This request soon became a demand, accompanied by a threat that those who did not comply would be punished, possibly even by confiscation of their property.

In spite of the injunction against SIPA's operating in the RS, on about March 24 the agency did arrest someone for money laundering in the Banja Luka area, in cooperation with the RS police. This led to speculation that Dodik's concern was more about the safety of his own skin than about complete separation from Bosnian agencies.

The Constitutional Court of Bosnia-Herzegovina quickly nullified Dodik's new decrees, but the Serb-controlled entity has ignored this. Meanwhile, the international community, with the exception of Russia, has reacted strongly against Dodik's moves. First of all, functionaries in the new US regime vigorously opposed the attempts at secession, much to Dodik's surprise. And it was not only to his surprise but also to those who recoil at authoritarian ways, because it seemed safe to assume that the new US president would "fall in love" with Dodik just as he had done with Kim Jong Un, Bolsonaro, Duterte, Vladimir P., and so on.

That support was not forthcoming, and the new Secretary of State Marco Rubio was the first to robustly reject the secession, saying "the last thing we need now is another conflict in Europe." In practically the only bipartisan agreement in recent US history, Congressmembers of both parties blasted Dodik, with Congresswoman Ann Wagner (R) calling him a "brutal criminal." A variety of politicians joined to make it clear that the official position of the US administration is to "oppose any kind of action of local leaders that would destroy stability and safety in Bosnia."

In response, Dodik stated that "this is a planned provocation against the constitutional order of Bosnia-Herzegovina; members of the US Embassy apparently have not heard that it is no longer Biden who is in charge, and that the USAID is no longer creating foreign policy." That last fanciful point may evidence creativity on Dodik's part, but it also may be a sign that Dodik has become nervous, as many people are saying.

Dodik is nervous because there is now a warrant out for his arrest, issued by the state-level prosecutor. This came after a prosecutorial summons was issued for Dodik to appear in Sarajevo at a hearing where he would be required to testify regarding his attempts to overthrow the constitutional order. Also summoned were Republika Srpska Prime Minister Radovan Višković and Nenad Stevandić, speaker of the RS Parliament. None of the three appeared at the March 10 hearing, and within a few days there was a "central warrant" for their arrest—meaning that any one of the 16 police bodies in the country were authorized and required to arrest them.

In a show of concern from Western Europe, the symbolic military deployment of EUFOR, the European Union's military force in Bosnia, was expanded by 400 soldiers. Additional helicopters were brought in as well, and their buzzing presence was felt from Sarajevo to Banja Luka and beyond. EUFOR jeeps and other vehicles augmented their presence throughout the country.

In the same days that the arrest warrant was filed, the Republika Srpska National Assembly (NSRS) held special sessions to promote the laws that would cement the secession. One was a draft of a new constitution for the RS that would create a new customs body, a taxation agency, an army, police intelligence agencies, and an independent judiciary. The draft annuls Bosnian citizenship and gives residents of the RS citizenship in the new "state," no longer an entity. It also establishes numerous other trappings of statehood, and proposes to abolish the upper house of the RS Parliament, called the Council of Peoples. Along with this, it abolishes the offices of Croat and Bosniak vice president. These two latter moves reduce the already low status of non-Serbs in the RS.

President Dodik also announced that the RS would form a new border patrol to replace the state-level border service; staff for this body would come from the RS police. This gets complicated, as border police must be established based on international agreements. Such agreements may be hard to come by, at least in the case of neighboring Croatia.

Support even from RS allies Russia and Serbia is in question. Both countries quite clearly have their hands full with Ukraine and with nation-wide unrest, respectively. And in the case of Serbia, there is at least a pretense of cooperation with the EU in the hope of one day gaining accession to that union. Some commentators read meaning into the fact that President Vučić noted an "international warrant" posted for the arrest of Dodik—while such a warrant has not yet been issued.

Furthermore, a planned appearance by Dodik before Serbia's parliament was cancelled. Similarly, a planned visit of Dodik to Russia to meet Putin was also cancelled, and he was informed that Putin did not have time to speak with him on the phone. Both of these developments put Dodik's standing and the secession of the RS in a weak position, and commentators continue to mention Dodik's "nervousness."

On the other hand, in a statement on March 21, the Russian Embassy in Bosnia expressed "serious concern about the worsening political situation...we are convinced that the activities of the illegitimate High Representative are the main reason for the crisis." And in a closed UN Security Council session on the same day, all members except Russia supported Bosnia's stability, as thus reported: "all countries supported the constitutional order, sovereignty, and territorial integrity of BiH, as well as state authorities, institutions, and the High Representative – except for Russia..."

With threats and rumors about his arrest flying about, Dodik took a strongly militarized unit of protection, complete with special police troops and armored personnel carriers, with him wherever he went in the RS.

Another desperate move to turn up support from the US was an appeal by Dodik to the US President to make a deal for the exploitation of the Republika Srpska's mineral wealth. That includes untapped lithium, nickel, and cobalt deposits in the northeastern part of the entity. It appears that, inspired by the fiasco underway in the relationship between Ukraine and the US, Dodik thought that he could grab the US president's attention by offering him these minerals.

In the couple of weeks since the warrant, no one has arrested Dodik, Višković, and Stevandić, and the three are freely traveling around the RS and beyond. At the time of the warrant's issue, Stevandić crossed the border into Serbia and back, and Dodik has recently made a trip to Israel to speak at a "conference on anti-Semitism."

The response of the Republika Srpska opposition, comprising the parties SDS and PDP, and ZPR among others, is a potential blow to secession. While the opposition parties on the whole are ordinarily a fractious and competitive bunch, it appears that they see a collective advantage in the downfall of Dodik and his party. Thus the opposition has boycotted crucial votes in the NSRS, and it expects that Dodik will not have sufficient votes to adopt the new constitution. A two-thirds majority vote is required, and people speaking for the opposition say that Dodik does not have the numbers.

SDS leader Milan Miličević commented that "the only danger to the RS is internal; Dodik has put the RS on the map of world problems. The fairy tale about a change of US policies toward Bosnia-Herzegovina has turned out to be a fantasy."

At times, speaker Stevandić has expelled members of the opposition parties from parliamentary sessions. Stevandić has proclaimed all those Serb opposition figures "enemies" and "traitors." And in accidental one hot-mic incident, he was heard saying, "We must kill them all. I'll kill them all." Soon after this, the car belonging to Nebojša Vukanović, leader of the ZPR party and prominent gadfly, was torched in front of his house in Trebinje.

Perennial Croat nationalist leader Dragan Čović also shows signs of turning his back on Dodik, with whom he has long been in an informal alliance. He is a politician who strives to present a cooperative, West-leaning approach to politics. With Dodik's crew efficiently undermining Bosnia's constitutional order, it would seem the prudent thing for Čović to reject chaos and promote cooperation—assuming, of course, that it preserves his position of power. He has just met both with opposition figures from the Republika Srpska, and with the governing coalition of the Federation.

A new alliance between Čović and these two groups would upend the prominent position Dodik's SNSD has held in state-level politics. Such an achievement would free up Bosnia to move closer to EU accession, as the SNSD has stood in the way of some of the reforms demanded by the EU. It could also un-block government functions at the state level where SNSD has enough power at present to disrupt operations significantly.

As of March 20, only two Serb members of SIPA, out of 300, had left to go over to the RS side. But this is not necessarily an indication that Dodik's secession has flopped. It is too early to tell, but it is hard to imagine how it can succeed. It is also difficult to ponder extensive violence, even though that would seem to be the most likely result of an arrest. The fact that it has not happened yet indicates that no one wants serious violence; I believe that to be the case on all sides.

But often, countries walk backwards into a war. The present crisis is still in full swing, with the ending entirely obscure. Stay tuned.