US Embassy: None of Bosnia’s two entities has right to secede

Neither the Dayton Agreement nor the Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina entitles any of the country’s two entities to the right to secede, the US Embassy said on Tuesday commenting on the latest statements by Bosnia’s Serb Presidency member Milorad Dodik.

“Territorial integrity and sovereignty of BiH as an integral state of two entities and Brcko District are guaranteed by the Dayton Peace Agreement. Neither the Dayton nor the Constitution of BiH gives the right to any entity to secede,” the Fena news agency quoted the Embassy’s Public Relations Office, which commented on Dodik’s statement that he would ask for all the decisions imposed by the High Representative to be revoked in six months otherwise Republika Srpska, one of two Bosnia’s semi-autonomous regions, would declare independence.

“Responsible leadership requires participation in government and adoption of key economic reforms as well as transparency reforms to improve the lives of citizens, not retrograde calls that only offer loss of any chance in the future,” said the Embassy.

On Saturday, Dodik called for the boycott of the institutions at the state level, including the state judiciary and the Indirect Taxation Authority.

“This is a hoax for the Serbs. Having to obey Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Constitutional Court, an absolute hoax by European Union, America and all those who are telling us here persistently,” Dodik said in response to the latest decision by Bosnia’s Constitutional Court, which disputed the RS Law on Forests according to which the forestry land in that part of BiH was named the property of Republika Srpska.

Dodik strongly objected the decision, stressing that there is no place in the world where a constitutional court would deal with such matters, stressing that “at this stage” Republika Srpska should dismiss any decision Bosnia’s Constitutional Court might make.

Similar to that, he deems that all the decisions imposed by the High Representative in BiH, should be dismissed as well.

“My stances will be radical. I will demand that all decisions imposed by the High Representatives are revoked, that we return to the original Dayton (Agreement – the peace deal which ended the 1992-95 war and which contains the country’s Constitution), and if that does not happen, to go to the (RS) National Assembly in six months and declare independence,” he stressed.