Latest news with #CatholicCroats
Yahoo
01-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
The battle to control assets behind Bosnia crisis
At the heart of the deepening crisis in Bosnia -- where Serb leader Milorad Dodik has been pushing the weak central government to the brink with threats of secession -- is a battle over who owns what. The 1995 Dayton peace deal that put an end to years of bloody war, forced ethnic Serbs -- who make up about 31 percent of the population -- to accept Bosnia's independence. In exchange they got their own statelet of Republika Srpska (RS) with 49 percent of the Balkan nation's territory. The Muslim majority and Catholic Croats live together in the country's other semi-autonomous half. But the thorny issue of who owned state property -- everything from rivers and forests to military installations -- was never resolved, putting a break on Bosnia's already ailing economy. Bosnian Muslims see the central state as the owner, a view shared by Christian Schmidt, the international envoy tasked with overseeing the Dayton accords and the country's governance. But Dodik insists each entity owns the property under its control, saying the issue is a "red line". He has accused Schmidt and Western powers of trying to deprive RS of "its assets" in order to weaken it and leave it as an "empty shell". - Legal brinkmanship - The game of legal brinkmanship began in 2022 when the RS parliament passed a law claiming all state property on its territory, but Schmidt annulled it the following year, as did Bosnia's constitutional court. Bosnian Serb lawmakers hit back passing laws saying rulings by the high representative and the constitutional court no longer apply in RS. Schmidt again suspended the laws and amended Bosnia's penal code to allow the courts to prosecute politicians who rejected decisions of the high representative and the constitutional court. Dodik ignored the threat and signed the suspended laws. As a result, he was charged with defying the decision of the high representative in August 2023. The 66-year-old Serb leader has repeatedly attacked Schmidt's actions as "illegal", arguing that his appointment was not approved by the UN Security Council. But in February Dodik was found guilty by the Sarajevo-based state court and sentenced to a year in prison and banned from office for six years. Dodik rejected the verdict, saying he would no longer attend the court, with the RS parliament upping the stakes further by banning Bosnia's judiciary and police from the statelet. - Cat and mouse game - In a further "provocation", he floated a new constitution for the statelet, as well as a breakaway army, border police, and possible confederation with neighbouring Serbia. That prompted Bosnia's state prosecutors to investigate Dodik, RS Prime Minister Radovan Viskovic and parliamentary speaker Nenad Stevandic for flouting the constitution. All three have refused to be questioned and last month Bosnia issued warrants for them. But their arrest was deemed too risky by the authorities, and Dodik travelled to Serbia on March 24 and then to Israel. Three days later Bosnia's state court issued an international arrest warrant for him. Despite being a wanted man, Dodik travelled to Moscow, from where he sent a video message late Monday praising Vladimir Putin. The Russian president said he was "very happy" to receive the Bosnian Serb leader when the two met in the Kremlin Tuesday. As of Tuesday evening, Interpol had yet to issue a "red notice" for Dodik's arrest on its website. While Bosnia has gone from one crisis to another, many analysts see this one -- with Dodik making open secessionist threats -- as the most serious since the end of the 1992-1995 war. Dodik's aim has been to slowly chip away at Bosnia's central institutions, said Veldin Kadic, a professor at the Sarajevo University Faculty of Political Science. He said he wanted to create a "state of legal anarchy... that could politically make Bosnia senseless as a state". "It's either Dodik or Bosnia and Herzegovina," he told AFP. rus/cbo/ljv/fg
Yahoo
28-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Pilgrim walks across Bosnia to help heal the lasting wounds of war
Josip Jelinic knelt down in the pouring rain, leaned on a wooden crucifix and uttered words that are still rare in Bosnia, 30 years after the end of a brutal civil war. "I forgive everyone, and I pray for forgiveness," he said. Jelinic, 32, is on a pilgrimage across Bosnia carrying an eight-kilogram (nearly 18-pound) cross and a Bosnian flag strapped to his backpack. On the way he is visiting towns, villages and war memorials, paying tribute to victims from all three communities that make up the country -- Bosnian Muslims, Orthodox Serbs and Catholic Croats. With Bosnia currently gripped by a political crisis and while Bosnian Serb leaders are stoking secessionist sentiment, Jelinic, a Catholic, is causing a stir. Residents emerge from their homes to invite him to eat and offer him a place to stay while cars honk their horns, people stop on the road to hug him, take a photo or tearfully give him money "for the road". On Tuesday, Jelinic stooped at the foot of the monument in the courtyard of the White Mosque of Stupni Do, central Bosnia, which is inscribed with the names of 38 Bosnian Muslim civilians killed in October 1993 by members of the Bosnian Croat forces. With his eyes closed, his forehead pressed against the cross, he prayed under the gaze of Imam Ramiz Zubaca, who hesitated between watching him and taking a photo of the scene. "Lord, you know the pain of this people, you know their suffering," said Jelinic. "I pray that war never comes again to Bosnia-Herzegovina. I pray that you grant us peace, you who are its king." - 1,000 kilometres - The imam and a few villagers said they were honoured by Jelinic's visit and invited him into the mosque. The conversation around a table adorned with a bouquet of red roses was warm and friendly. The hosts were fasting for Ramadan but one man brought their visitor cakes, chocolate-covered dates and cherry juice. "It means a lot to us," said Zubaca, promising that Bosnia's three communities "are ready" for true reconciliation. "But the problem," he added, "is politics, which, unfortunately, is hindering reconciliation. "Politics creates artificial problems, brings doubt, insecurity. What Josip is doing is what we need." Stupni Do is one of the dozens of stages of Jelinic's 1,000-kilometre (620-mile) "Way of the Cross" that he began on February 26 at the Shrine of Our Lady in the town of Medjugorje. His "walk for the reconciliation of the peoples of Bosnia and Herzegovina" is scheduled to end on April 18 -- two days before Easter Sunday, the most important day in the Christian calendar. "I've been walking for 20 days and I've met people from all three communities," said Jelinic during a stop between Stupni Do and the next village, Borovica, where 18 Croatian civilians and soldiers were killed in November 1993 by Bosnian Muslim forces. "They're all good people who have opened their hearts to me. The overwhelming majority of people want peace." - 'This is Bosnia!' - The intercommunal conflict from 1992 to 1995 left nearly 100,000 dead in Bosnia. Jelinic, a physiotherapist from Ljubuski and a recent Catholic evangelist, was born during the war and has no memories of it. But he feels the pain wherever he goes. "There are surely people today who are still deeply hurt... I hope these people forgive and I hope peace returns to their hearts. Resentment is a poison that ravages human beings," he told AFP. "We must not forget the victims, and we will never forget them. We must always remember them. But for us, for the peace in our hearts, I call for forgiveness." Ismet Abdulahovic, a 68-year-old Bosnian Muslim, stopped on the road in Vares to greet Jelinic. "This is exceptional, rare, what an honourable young man! We need this, and no tension between people," he said A little further on, in the village of Pogar, Jelinic's pilgrimage was forced to a halt. Andjelka Petrovic, 52, and her husband, both Croats, refused to let him pass. "He carries messages of love and peace. It's refreshing. He has united everyone, all of Bosnia and Herzegovina," explained Andjelka, 52, who said she was "moved and honoured". She and her husband set up a table in front of their house and served food and drink. "This is Bosnia!" smiled Jelenic between bites, as the clouds gave way to a perfectly blue sky. rus/cbo/phz
