BELGRADE: Serbia rejected on Saturday a Bosnian appeals court ruling upholding a prison sentence for Milorad Dodik, the leader of Bosnia’s ethnic Serb entity, the Republika Srpska (RS).
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said the court decision undermined security in the Balkan region.
In February, a court in the Bosnian capital, Sarajevo, sentenced Dodik to one year behind bars for defying rulings by the international envoy overseeing Bosnia’s 1995 peace accords.
It also banned Dodik, who has not so far been arrested, from holding office for six years.
Bosnia’s appeals court said on Friday it had upheld the lower court ruling and no further appeal was allowed.
Speaking after an emergency meeting of Serbia’s National Security Council, Vucic said the rulings were “a destabilising factor.”
“The security situation in the region has been seriously undermined,” he alleged.
Since the end of Bosnia’s ethnic conflict in the 1990s, the country of 3.5 million has consisted of two autonomous halves — the Serb-dominated RS and a Muslim-Croat federation.
The two are linked by weak central institutions, while each has its own government and parliament.
Dodik has repeatedly threatened to pull the Serb statelet out of Bosnia’s central institutions — including its army, judiciary and tax system.
Asked on Saturday asked whether Dodik would be arrested if a warrant were issued and he entered Serbian territory, Vucic said he would not.
“All relevant state authorities are obliged to respect the decision of the National Security Council,” he said.
“Milorad Dodik is welcome on the territory of the Republic of Serbia. He is the legitimately, legally elected president of Republika Srpska.”
In its conclusions, which Vucic read out, the security council said the Bosnian appeal court ruling was undemocratic, immoral and “a serious attack on the Serbian people of Bosnia and Herzegovina.”
“The political and security situation in the region has been seriously destabilized,” the council continued.
“There is a tendency toward further deterioration and an incitement to ethnic conflict directly targeting the Serbian people,” it alleged.
The council “urged all actors in the region to remain calm and approach the situation rationally“
It added: “Such acts directly undermine the constitutional order of Bosnia and Herzegovina, established by the Dayton peace agreement.”
Vucic said Serbia would continue to insist on full respect for the 1995 Dayton accords and said the current situation was the most difficult for the country in many years.
Reacting on X, Dodik thanked Vucic and the security council.
“Serbia has always been committed to Republika Srpska and has never done anything against
Bosnia and Herzegovina,” he said.
Dodik’s conviction set off a crisis that many observers considered the worst since Bosnia’s 1992-95 war.
He has rejected the trial and his conviction as “political.”
In response, the RS parliament passed a law prohibiting Bosnia’s central police and judicial authorities from operating in the Serb entity.
Bosnia’s constitutional court annulled those laws in May.
