Envoy: US ready to confront attempts to tear Bosnia apart
SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) - The United States is paying very close attention to Bosnia's political crisis and has tools it can use against the divisive nationalist leaders in the war-scared, multiethnic Balkan country who would try to "tear it apart," a senior U.S. official said Tuesday.
"Our appeal to leaders (in Bosnia) ... is to rise above their own self-interest and to try to keep in mind the broader interest of their county," U.S. State Department Counselor Derek Chollet told The Associated Press in an interview.
"If leaders continue on the path toward divisiveness, disintegration, withdrawal from the central institutions, there are tools we have to punish that kind of behavior," he added, mentioning possible sanctions.
Chollet, who serves as an adviser to the U.S. secretary of state, arrived in Bosnia on Monday for three days of meetings with its top political leaders amid the Balkan country´s worst political crisis since a U.S.-brokered peace deal ended more than 3 1/2 years of bloodshed in 1995.
The Bosnian War started in 1992 when Belgrade-backed Bosnian Serbs tried to create ethnically pure region with the aim of joining neighboring Serbia by driving out the country's Croats and Bosniaks, who are mostly Muslim. More than 100,000 people were killed and upward of 2 million, or over half of the country´s population, were driven from their homes before a peace agreement was reached in Dayton, Ohio, in November 1995.
The agreement divided Bosnia into two regions - the Serb-run Republika Srpska and the Bosniak-Croat Federation - which were given wide autonomy but remain linked by some joint institutions including the multi-ethnic presidency, the parliament, the army, the top judiciary and the tax administration.
U.S. State Department Counselor Derek Chollet speaks during an interview with the Associated Press in the capital Sarajevo, Bosnia, Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2021. The United States is paying very close attention to the situation in Bosnia and has tools it can utilize against the divisive nationalist leaders in the war-scared, multiethnic Balkan country who would try to "tear it apart," a senior U.S. official said. (AP Photo)
Serbs have for years been advocating the separation of their mini-state from the rest of Bosnia. But their hardline leader, Milorad Dodik, who has tacit support from Russia and Serbia, recently upped the drive by pledging that the Bosnian Serb region would, by the end of November, declare the creation of its own army and judiciary.
Dodik, who serves as the Serb member of Bosnia's multi-ethnic presidency, has threatened to take over Bosnian army barracks in the Serb half of the country once the Bosnian Serb military is formed. He said if the West tries to intervene, he would call his Bosnian Serb "friends" for help.
"We are very worried," said Chollet. "There is a lot of attention in Washington about the situation here, a lot of concerns about the trajectory that Bosnia is on and fears, first time in 26 years, (the) Dayton (peace agreement) is at its most perilous moment."
However, Chollet said the United States still believes that Bosnia "has not passed the point of no return."
"We still believe that there is chance to stop all this ... and it is not just the United States, it is our partners in Europe," he added.
He said it will take work to bolster Bosnia's democratic institutions and direct the country toward a goal of eventually joining the European Union.
"There is going to be a lot of hard decisions that have to be made, but the United States is committed to do whatever we can to try to prevent the worst from happening and, more than that, try to achieve an even better outcome" by putting Bosnia "back on its path towards its Euro-Atlantic destination," he said.
U.S. State Department Counselor Derek Chollet speaks during an interview with the Associated Press in the capital Sarajevo, Bosnia, Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2021. The United States is paying very close attention to the situation in Bosnia and has tools it can utilize against the divisive nationalist leaders in the war-scared, multiethnic Balkan country who would try to "tear it apart," a senior U.S. official said. (AP Photo)
U.S. State Department Counselor Derek Chollet speaks during an interview with the Associated Press in the capital Sarajevo, Bosnia, Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2021. The United States is paying very close attention to the situation in Bosnia and has tools it can utilize against the divisive nationalist leaders in the war-scared, multiethnic Balkan country who would try to "tear it apart," a senior U.S. official said. (AP Photo)
In this photo provided by the Bosnian Presidential Press Service, U.S. State Department Counselor Derek Chollet, third right, poses with U.S. Ambassador to Bosnia and Herzegovina Eric Nelson, left, Croat member of the tripartite Presidency of Bosnia Zeljko Komsic, second left, Muslim member of the tripartite Presidency of Bosnia Sefik Dzaferovic, third left, Bosnian Serb member of the tripartite Presidency of Bosnia Milorad Dodik, second right, and U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Gabriel Escobar, right, in Sarajevo, Bosnia, Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2021. The United States is paying very close attention to the situation in Bosnia and has tools it can utilize against the divisive nationalist leaders in the war-scared, multiethnic Balkan country who would try to "tear it apart," a senior U.S. official said. (Bosnian Presidential Press Service via AP)
In this photo provided by the Bosnian Presidential Press Service, Bosnian Serb member of the tripartite Presidency of Bosnia Milorad Dodik, right, speaks with U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Gabriel Escobar, in Sarajevo, Bosnia, Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2021. The United States is paying very close attention to the situation in Bosnia and has tools it can utilize against the divisive nationalist leaders in the war-scared, multiethnic Balkan country who would try to "tear it apart," a U.S. State Department Counselor Derek Chollet said. (Bosnian Presidential Press Service via AP)
In this photo provided by the Bosnian Presidential Press Service, U.S. State Department Counselor Derek Chollet, left, shakes hands with Croat member of the tripartite Presidency of Bosnia Zeljko Komsic in Sarajevo, Bosnia, Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2021. Muslim member of the tripartite Presidency of Bosnia Sefik Dzaferovic is second right and Bosnian Serb member of the tripartite Presidency of Bosnia Milorad Dodik is right right. The United States is paying very close attention to the situation in Bosnia and has tools it can utilize against the divisive nationalist leaders in the war-scared, multiethnic Balkan country who would try to "tear it apart," a senior U.S. official said. (Bosnian Presidential Press Service via AP)
