Sarajevo, March 28, 2024 (AFP)
Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik on Thursday slammed sweeping poll reforms aimed at improving transparency, vowing to block decisions made by the country's central institutions if they were not scrapped.
Dodik's remarks came days after Bosnia's international high representative Christian Schmidt announced plans for overhauling election laws.
Schmidt is charged with overseeing the enforcement of the Dayton Agreement that ended Bosnia's bloody civil war in the 1990s.
He enjoys wide powers, including imposing or annulling laws and sacking elected officials.
Dodik has refused to recognise Schmidt's authority after Russia and China dropped their support for the envoy at the United Nations.
Dodik told the parliament of Bosnia's Serb statelet that if the election reform package was not annulled in seven days, he would block decisions made at Bosnia's central institutions.
"I am going to the end for the Republika Srpska and for the Serb people.. I am launching a new phase of combat," said Dodik, referring to Bosnia's Serb entity.
Dodik and Schmidt have been locked in a high-stakes tug-of-war for nearly a year.
Dodik is currently on trial for signing legislation that refused to recognise decisions made by Schmidt.
Last July, Schmidt struck down two laws passed by the parliament of Bosnia's Serbian entity which refused to recognise him and the country's top court.
Dodik has remained defiant, vowing to fight the charges in a trial that marks a potential tipping point for post-war Bosnia.
The case will likely serve as a litmus test of the weak central government's ability to hold a leading politician to account after openly flouting the country's peace accords and court system.
The latest flare-up comes just a week after EU leaders agreed to open talks with Bosnia on joining the bloc, though negotiations will only begin in earnest once the Balkan country has passed more key reforms.
Bosnia has been governed by a dysfunctional administrative system created under the Dayton pact that divides the country into two bodies -- a Muslim-Croat federation and a Bosnian entity known as Republika Srpska (RS).
The two entities are guaranteed a large degree of autonomy and connected by a weak central government.

Sumber : AFP