Collapsing Bosnia

Bosnia-Herzegovina as independent state was created by the Dayton peace agreement 1995 after bloody Bosinian war 1992-95. Besides ending war the aim of Deaton agreement was to build strong state institutions for newcomer and international community indeed has invested billions of euro for this capacity building. The outcome of this huge aid – compared that population in Bosnia is some 4 million – however is poor. Instead of strong state institutions the state itself is tumbling down. The causes of potential collapse are at least the background before Dayton agreement, the agreement itself, culmination of ethnic and religious tensions during and after the war and today’s (geo)political situation in West Balkans. One factor not to be underrated is also the lack of national Bosnia-Herzegovina identity.

The background

When nazi-Germany occupied Yugoslavia on 1941, Bosnia-Hezegovina came under Croatian Ustasha movement. Part of Bosnian Muslims supported this ultranationalist administration which killed hundreds of thousands Serbs, Jews and Roma civilians during WWII. After war the ethnic tensions in Bosnia-Herzegovina, one of the six Republics in Yugoslavia federation, were formally nonexistent according President Tito’s ideals, however they still lived in peoples memories.

The breakup wars of Yugoslavia had started from Slovenia and Croatia and after Bosnia the next conflict started in separatist Serbia’s Kosovo province. From former Yugoslavia republics Macedonia and Montenegro came independent peacefully according mutual agreements between them and Serbia - the heir of Yugoslavia.

Secret discussions between Franjo Tudman and Slobodan Milosevic on the division of Bosnia and Herzegovina between Serbia and Croatia were held as early as March 1991 known as Karadordevo agreement. When Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina declared independency, the Serbs attacked with aim to secure those lands where Serbs had a majority, eastern and western Bosnia. The Croats also had aim of expanding Croatia's borders. Bosnian Muslims, the only ethnic group loyal to the Bosnian government, were an easy target, because the Bosnian government forces were poorly equipped and unprepared for the war.

War 1992-95

When extremely brutal war in Croatia between Croats and Serbs was ongoing the some 44% of population in Bosnia were sc. Bosniaks, 31 % Serbs, 17 % Croats and 6 % others. Bosniaks were Muslims, Serbs Orthodox and Croats catholics.

The Serbs received support from Christian Slavic fighters from countries including Russia and Greece. Some radical Western fighters as well as numerous individuals from the cultural area of Western Christianity fought as volunteers for the Croats including Neo-Nazi volunteers from Germany and Austria. The Bosniaks received support from Islamic groups commonly known as "holy warriors" (Mujahideen) and e also several hundred Iranian Revolutionary Guards were assisting them. United States used both C-130 transports and Islamist groups to smuggle weapons to the Bosnian government forces via Croatia. NATO involvement took place during the 1995 when they attacked to Serb positions in wars final stages.

In an attempt to protect the civilians in Bosnia-Herzegovina was also international peacekeepers – UNPROFOR - which role was to protect the "safe havens" like Srebrenica. On the ground their actual role was as bystander. Various paramilitary units were operating in Bosnian war: The Serb and Croat paramilitaries involved volunteers from Serbia and Croatia, and were supported by nationalist political parties in those countries.

Up till 1993 the Croats and Bosniaks had been fighting side by side against the Serbs. Then the Croat-Bosniak alliance started to break and most famous event took place in Mostar when in the early hours of May 9, 1993, the Croats attacked against Bosniaks using artillery, mortars, heavy weapons and small arms and destroying a the famous 16^th century Turkish bridge.

Characteristic to Bosnian war was widespread killings, the siege of towns, ethnic cleansing, torture in detention centers conducted more or less by all ethnic parties. The most recent research places the number of victims at around 100,000–110,000 killed (civilians and military), and 1.8 million displaced.

Rising radical Islam

Shaul Shay, an officer in the military Late intelligence of the Israeli Defense Forces and expert on international and fundamentalist Islamic terrorism, analyzes in his book "Islamic Terror and the Balkans" the growth of radical Islam in the Balkans. He shows how the war in Bosnia and the war in Kosovo provided the historical opportunity for radical Islam to penetrate the Balkans.

“After 9/11, when the US started examining the financing of terror organizations, it discovered that many of the Islamic charities that operated during and after the war in the Balkans were channeling “terror” money . A big chunk of that money that was supposed to be used for humanitarian purposes went to finance those [Islamic terror] infrastructures, ” Shay stated.

Radical Islam has enforced and widened their activities in Balkans last 15 years. During Bosnian war many foreign islamists came to fight in mujahedeen brigade also many Al Quida figures - including Osama bin Laden - were supporting Bosnan Muslims 1990's. It was reported that Muslim authorities had issued a Bosnian passport to Osama bin Laden at the Bosnian embassy in Vienna in 1993.

Later radical Islam groups gave their support to KLA/UCK (Kosovo) which leaders now are leading Kosovo province based US and EU support. After bombing campaign 1999 radical Islam has been one major donor in Kosovo and Wahhabi schools and former secularized Kosovo Muslims are displaced by radical Islamic movement. While supporting Albanian Kosovo US and EU are securing a safe haven both to islamic terrorists and leading heroin cartel to say nothing of smaller threads. This short-sighted policy should be reconsidered once again.

Dayton agreement

Brutal and bloody Bosnian war (1992-95) had almost finished ethnic cleansings/transfer of populations so that it was possible to draw administrative boundaries according ethnical groups. This made Dayton Agreement possible. The agreement split Bosnia into two semi-independent entities – the Serb Republic and the Muslim-Croat Federation and three ethnic groups – Croats, Serbs and Bosniaks – are trying to lead state together and separately. Entities are united by weak central institutions, administration is quite heavy loaded with some 170 ministers and whole system is supervised by international presence. (Note: Dayton Agreement one may find from here.)

Bosnia was the crucible in which the EU's foreign policy instruments were created. With an EU military force still here, a EU special representative with executive powers, a huge EU aid budget and a full-scale EU police mission, the EU has more leverage in Bosnia than in any other country.

Besides huge international administrative and security representation Dayton Agreement made base for triple local administration. There are 180 ministers and three parliaments in one federal republic. One can easily understand what a challenge the management of this administration is when same time the ruling class is composed from people who used to be enemies.

Three roads to separation

Based to increasing ethnic divide and nationalism as internal factor and Dayton Agreement as outside framework year 2008 has shown that separatism is gaining strength.

Serbianna news headline on 11^th Oct.2008 is quite informative - “Islamic terror victimizing Bosnian Croats”. The statement of Croatian NGO Libertas claims that "After several denary terror attacks on Croatian returnees in central Bosnia, after several murders of children of which the last was in Sarajevo and after the latest murder of Croats in FIS Vitez and relentless attacks on Croatian property in Bosnia, why hasn't anyone been held accountable,". Libertas made public statement in which it says that Croatians in Bosnia are victims of Bosnian Muslim terror and are asking Bosnian Croat political leadership to initiate a plan that will break up the Bosnian Federation entity and form a Croatian one.

On 3^rd November 2008 came information, that the government of Bosnia’s Serb-dominated entity of Republika Srpska, has hired a US law firm to deal with the Office of the High Representative (OHR) and upcoming key reforms. Republika Srpska Premier Milorad Dodik said that the firm, Dewey and LeBoeuf, will advise his government on relations with the international community and all other legal matters. So far, the OHR was the ultimate interpreter of the Dayton peace accord and hence the main interpreter of its own mandate. But by hiring a United States law firm specialised in international law, Dodik’s is seen as moving his arguments against the OHR onto legal grounds.

In addition to hiring the US law firm, Dodik has recently confirmed that his government has hired a US lobbying company that was supposed to represent Republika Srpska in Washington and other western countries. Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim) officials complained that this, as well as the opening of Republika Srpska offices abroad, showed that Republika Srpska continue taking responsibilities which belong to the state. Some Bosniak officials also complained that Dodik is strengthening its representation abroad as a part of lobbying that should soften world powers to the idea of Republika Srpska’s eventual declaration of independence.

So Croats and Serbs have started their separation process which leaves Bosniaks left. They also have more nationalistic agenda which however is not separatist but rather conquering. Chairman of the Bosnian Presidency Haris Silajdžić has frequently made statement on the need to abolish the two entities that comprise Bosnia-Herzegovina, and the need to create an undivided country not made up of federal units. Poisonous relations and clashes between the Bosniak and Serb leaders are at the heart of the current crisis in Bosnia-Hercegovina, which is why fears have revived that were the basis for the start of the war in 1992.

Is Bosnia-Herzegovina collapsing?

On end of October the EU Enlargement Commissioner, Olli Rehn, said that that “…progress can be achieved and crises overcome, when the political will exists”. “However, this consensus has since collapsed and reforms halted”. On 27th Oct. 2008 EU’s foreign policy chief Javier Solana said in Brussels that the EU has warned politicians in Bosnia they are jeopardising the country’s Euro-Atlantic integration with the heated nationalist rhetoric.

On 22nd Oct. 2008 the former United States diplomat Richard Holbrooke and former High Representative in Bosnia Paddy Ashdown published an article urging European Union and US leaders to reinforce their engagement in Bosnia and halt a new crisis which threatens to bring the country to collapse. The two diplomats say that Bosnian Serb Prime Minister Milorad Dodik has taken advantage of the weakness of constitutional state structures, fatigue and the international community’s saturation, as well as the inability of the EU to meet its own conditions, and over the course of the last two years has succeeded in destroying the majority of the real progress made in Bosnia-Hercegovina in the last 13 years."

The EU has presented Bosnian leaders with its bleak progress report and sent a separate letter expressing “extreme concern” with the developments in the country, media reported on 6^th November 2008. “We are extremely concerned over the political climate which is being created by your officials at all levels: boosting fears and divisions instead of associations is contrary to your European project,” said a letter sent from the French presidency of the EU, on behalf of Olli Rehn, the bloc’s Enlargement Commissioner, and Javier Solana, the EU’s foreign policy chief.

The worries of top politicians have good base. It is not anymore dispute between Serbs and Bosniaks, this year has showed serious dissension between Bosniaks and Croats which may be related to rise of radical Islam in Balkans. Many of Bosnia's Croats want a 'third entity' as a means to secure equality within Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Future

Western mainstream media (MSM) and reports of international organizations and NGOs have told many stories about capacity building of new multi-ethnic state with European perspective. The events now and earlier are forcing to ask if the picture created by MSM is the right one. I do not have that kind of illusion. Few keywords to explain my view are the past, national identity and short-sighted top-to-bottom policy approach.

The recent past of Bosnia-Herzegovina is violent and there was not only one brutal side – there was three of them. This past has its impact today and real truth behind successful propaganda about events of war 1992-95 is still unclear.

One may have seen pictures where Bosnian Muslims (Bosniaks) and Bosnian Croats have been busy rioting again following the defeat of Croatia by Turkey in the Euro 2008 football match. The Bosniaks supported Turkey, the Croats Croatia. Meanwhile when Serbia plays Bosnia, Bosnian Serbs root for Serbia. This gives quite clear picture about national identity and multi-ethnic ideals – or lack of them. Can any country survive without some minimal mutual self-identification across its citizens as a whole? If the shared non-ethnic Bosnian identity is taking steps backwards does this not mean that this artificial western desk-drawer plan is doomed to fail? I am afraid so but maybe it is loss only for those top level designers not for local population.

Dayton Agreement was scribbled by top western diplomats and the major problem to implement it is that, as told before, Bosnian war had many frontlines on the field. When top policy level tries widen their high ideals on the ground the commitment of local stakeholders will be in question.

The real lesson of Bosnia is that the creation of a peaceful multiethnic state with a strong central government is a dangerous mirage. Holding together an artificial state with ethnic or religious cleavages using foreign military power is unlikely to be successful anywhere.

Decentralization in both Bosnia, as well in Kosovo and Iraq, is the only hope for peace and prosperity. Sustainable development is possible only with local commitment to aims and actions. The pragmatic results can be achieved by participatory planning from bottom to top.

As bottom line short quote I can agree: "There can be no question of coercing any large areas in which one community has a majority to live against their will under a government in which another community has a majority. And the only alternative to coercion is partition." – Lord Mountbatten, explaining the need for separate states for India and Pakistan.

More my articles from Balkans and Caucasus one may find from my Archives:BalkanBlog , which includes also a document library and link list over issues related to this article.