Bosnian state prosecutors on Wednesday ordered the arrest of Serb separatist leader Milorad Dodik and his aides for ignoring a court summons, a move Dodik vowed to resist with the help of Russia.
It is known that the dispute, which pits Dodik and his allies Russia and Serbia against the US and the EU, is one of the biggest threats to peace in the Balkans since the conflicts of the 1990s that followed the collapse of socialist Yugoslavia.
And it began after Dodik, the president of the autonomous Serb Republic of Bosnia, challenged the decisions of the international envoy to Bosnia, whose role is to prevent the multi-ethnic Balkan state from sliding into conflict.
Dodik was sentenced to a year in prison and banned from holding office for six years in a court ruling that he can appeal.
In response, Dodik initiated laws banning the judiciary and state police from the Region.
The state prosecutor’s office then opened what it described as an attack on the constitutional order, writes Reuters.
On Wednesday, it sought Dodik’s arrest for failing to respond to the court’s summons, although it was unclear whether it intended to detain him and his allies or simply escort them to court.
“This is a worthless business,” Dodik said at a press conference in the Regional center of Banja Luka, showing the arrest warrant.
“This is politically motivated and we do not want to participate in it,” he added.
It is reported that Dodik is planning to hold high-level meetings with Russian representatives in the coming days.
He said at the conference that he would ask Russia to veto the extension of the European peacekeeping mission for Bosnia at the United Nations Security Council, which is due in November.
Meanwhile, the EU peacekeeping force, EUFOR, announced that it had begun deploying reserve forces to Bosnia to maintain stability and security.
She declined to give the number of troops, but hundreds of new soldiers are expected to arrive.
The State Investigation and Protection Agency confirmed that it has received a request to assist the state court police in capturing Dodik, Regional Prime Minister Radovan Viskovic and parliament speaker Nenad Stevandic.
Otherwise, the Bosnian Serb Republic and the Bosniak-Croat Federation are two Regions created after the 1992-1995 Bosnian war, in which 100,000 people died.
They are bound by a weak central government in a state supervised by an international authority known as the high representative, currently Christian Schmidt.
On Wednesday, the Serbian Region’s parliament convened in an attempt to adopt a new constitution for Republika Srpska, which would undo all reforms agreed upon in the decades following the signing of the US-backed Dayton peace agreement that ended the war.
Schmidt warned that changing the constitution was a violation of the peace agreement and represented “a serious risk.”
He called on MPs to reject “this attack on the constitutional order of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the multi-ethnic character of Republika Srpska.”
Dodik on Wednesday said he planned to label Schmidt’s office a “criminal organization” in Republika Srpska.
Russia, Serbia and Hungary have backed Dodik, who has said his Region should secede from Bosnia and join Serbia.
Moscow has called the Bosnian court’s decision “a blow to stability in the Balkan Region.”
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, however, said Dodik’s actions were undermining Bosnia’s institutions and threatening its security and stability, calling on US partners in the Region to “unite against this dangerous and destabilising behaviour”.
His statement was a blow to Dodik, who hopes that President Donald Trump’s administration will favor the Serbian separatist agenda.
