Deutsche Welle raises alarm for Balkans, history can repeat

It's not utopia, but a German-language media article, Deutsche Welle, which highlights the highly complex situation in the Western Balkans and the danger that a new war could erupt.

From a clear war crimes rhetoric by Milorad Dodik in Bosnia and Herzegovina, or the Serb lobby for denying the genocide in Srebrenica, there must be vigilance for a possible escalation throughout the Balkans.

Above all, with a highly complicated situation even in northern Kosovo, where there is an immediate political stagnation, but a sometimes dangerous language towards escalation.

What does the Deutsche Welle article warn?

Signals from the Balkans are repeating history?

It is not uncommon to re-launch conflict centres in the Balkans. Now a planned UN resolution on genocide in Srebrenica is under way. Serbian politicians see a collective branding of the Serbian people there.

The symbol was threatening: Milorad Dodik, the leader of the Bosnian Serbs and president of Republika Srpska, the Serb-dominated part of Bosnia and Herzegovina, announced in the presence of representatives from the Belgrade government that it “does not see any meaning remaining in Bosnia”. Dodik further: “We will continue further independent”. And as always he repeated, there was no genocide in Srebrenica.

But now Rwanda and Germany have brought to the United Nations a resolution on which the UN General Assembly will declare July 11th as the day of international commemoration of the genocide in Srebrenica. Representatives from Serbia and Republika Srpska have risen sharply against the resolution, which they see as collective branding of the Serbian people.

Irritative are also Milorad Dodik's verbal speculations about how he should deal with 150,000 Bosnian returnees, so those Bosnian Muslims who were expelled during the war in the 1992-1995 and after the war returned. After he declared, that Bosniaks who are more than 50% of the territory in Bosnia and Herzegovina must live in 25% of the territory, he warned, that in the event of the resolution's accession, the only option is peaceful separation from Bosnia and Herzegovina. The “people in Republika Srpska are angry and will refuse to live with Bosnian Muslims. ”

Denying genocide in Dodik's repertorage of statements

Dodik's 25% declaration is very clear to recall the rhetoric preceding ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Systemic crimes planned were intended to eliminate everything not Serb in large parts of Bosnia and Herzegovina. These crimes were documented by The Hague's Tribunal, the International War Crimes Tribunal, and in the Srebrenica case they were named genocide. Although Bosnian law envisions the sentence in the case of denial of genocide, Dodik has, in effect, introduced this denial into the common rhetoric of his statements. At a recent mass rally in mid-April in Banja Luka, in the presence of thousands of Serbs and Serbian Parliament Speaker Anna Brnabyq, he reiterated the genocide denial in Srebrenica again. He concluded his speech. Russia. ”

Soon Dodik traveled to Russia with his party's friend, Nenad Nessic, security minister in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Among other things, Dodik also met with Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Ptrusev. Dodik and Nessic posted a photo by their plane, showing their three-finger greeting, symbol of Serbian ethno-nationalistism. On Serbian television, Nessic said recently, my “country is Serbia. My country is Republika Srpska. Period. ”

What is noteworthy is that despite violations of the 1995 Dayton Peace Accords, the guard of this agreement, the High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina, Christian Schmidt, is silent. In autumn 2023, Schmidt threatened Dodik with “serious consequences”, if he continues to scale the situation. And although Dodik continues with separatist efforts, Schmidt continues to remain silent.

Preparation for Worst Screenplay

EUFOR troops, deployed by the EU and ensuring the Dayton Agreement, will have to add patrols to the returnees' areas, which requires increasing their number. The 150,000 potential victims, which the former High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina, Lord Paddy Ashdown who's passed away, called the poorest “of the poor”, had to go through hell. The Dodi threat and retraumatization is objective. The West should act biasedly, for example through protected areas protected militarily, possible actions of evacuation and restricted flying zones, writes the Albanian Post.

This may sound unrealistic, but survivors of Serb massacres in the spring of 1992 live in a climate of fear. This remains real, as long as Serbian Centiate associations each year remember their massacre in Visegrad with celebrations and remain unpunished, as long as the nationalist bands of the Cyclones “-Uyks1> pass through Republika Srpska, and the RS president denies genocide.

potential for scaling

For the commander of NATO troops for Europe (SACEUR), General Christopher Cavoli, the situation is serious. Before the US Congress on April 17th, he said: “The situation in the Western Balkans has deteriorated. Ethnic tensions in Bosnia have the potential to scale. Republika Srpska, according to Cavoli, tries to retain the state's “authority” and relations with the EU and NATO and simultaneously maintain strong ties with Russia. Secretary - General NATO, Jens Stoltenberg said, is “deeply concerned” for continuing “sensitistic sensitistic policy” in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Serbian politician Anna Brnabic called Cavoli's statements “a disturbing message” and threatened that “would create a precedent if they passed the Srebrenica resolution at the UN General Assembly. They'll open Pandora's box. God saves them with what they do next. ”

Now the free sunset has to take measures to save one of the most successful peace projects since the Marshall Plan. NATO showed impressively in Kosovo in September 2023, that within a few days it could end a conflict that youth. The West must do so preventably to save Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Alexander Rhotert investigates since 1991 for the former Yugoslavia and has worked in different positions for the UN, NATO, the OSCE and High Representative in Bosnia and Herzegovina.