Envoy warns of Bosnia-EU crisis

Bosnia is in the middle of a crisis and needs to decide whether it is serious about closer ties with the European Union, the international high representative in the country, Miroslav Lajcák, said in Brussels on Wednesday (7 November).

Lajcák, who also serves as EU special representative in Sarajevo, was in Brussels to discuss the deteriorating situation in Bosnia with EU and NATO officials.

He said that there was "no strategic agreement on the future" among Bosnia’s politicians.

Lajcák’s visit came on the very day that Boris Tadic, Serbia’s president, was in Brussels to put his initials to a pre-accession agreement with the EU. A similar agreement with Bosnia is blocked by the Bosnian Serb refusal to have its separate police force integrated into a country-wide structure.

The latest crisis was sparked by measures put forward by Lajcák’s Office of the High Representative (OHR) to streamline the country’s complicated decision-making structures. The measures would lower the quorum required for laws to be passed, making it more difficult for lawmakers and ministers to block legislation by not attending sessions of Bosnia’s central institutions.

The Bosnian Serbs have threatened to boycott the country’s central institutions and Prime Minister Nikola Špiric, a member of the party which rules the Bosnian Serb entity in Bosnia, resigned last Thursday (1 November) in protest at the OHR’s plans.

Lajcák described the proposals as "very modest" in substance and the Bosnian Serb response as an "overreaction".

He said that closer ties with the EU were still possible through a compromise package that would leave the question of the Bosnian Serb police for later, after the country’s constitution had been revised.

Bosnia is in the middle of a crisis and needs to decide whether it is serious about closer ties with the European Union, the international high representative in the country, Miroslav Lajcák, said in Brussels on Wednesday (7 November).