Maxim Edwards, British journalist covering Central and Eastern Europe and a former editor at openDemocracy and OCCRP/The Atlantic
Once praised by Madeleine Albright as “a breath of fresh air,” Bosnia’s new president, Milorad Dodik, now threatens a fragile U.S.-brokered peace accord.
Few national leaders would call their own country an “impossible state.” Fewer still would actively advocate for it to be broken up. Almost none would risk a decades-old peace accord to do so. And then there is Bosnia’s Milorad Dodik.
“I am a Serb … Bosnia is only my place of employment,” Dodik proclaimed just a day after his inauguration as Bosnia’s head of state. A Serb nationalist, he has publicly called for the statelet he comes from, Republika Srpska, to break away from Bosnia. And, as Bosnian president, he has said he will not use his Bosnian passport for overseas travel. It’s these kinds of outbursts—almost Trumpian in their ability to provoke—for which he has become notorious.
The story of Dodik’s rise is one of a far cannier political operator than his brash public image might suggest. He was once hailed as a “breath of fresh air” by Madeleine Albright; she, like others, hoped he symbolized a clean break from the war criminals who had ruled the territory. Two decades on, though, he is seen as a nationalist enfant terrible threatening a fragile peace. What changed, and how?
In some ways, Dodik’s story is a familiar one, that of a politician changing his stripes when the moment suits, and courting Russia as an ally. But here in Bosnia, the stakes are higher, not just for the people who live here, but for the legacy of a significant American foreign-policy achievement, too. By taking aim at the Bosnian state, Dodik is, in effect, targeting the Dayton Accords, one of the signature peace deals of the 20th century. When signed at an American air base in 1995, the agreement ended what had been Europe’s most devastating conflict since the Second World War, one which had cost more than 100,000 lives. (Unsurprisingly, Dodik’s threats to undermine the accords have earned him U.S. sanctions.)
The Dayton Accords left all sides dissatisfied and nurturing grievances, but brokered a brittle peace. In the process, they shaped modern Bosnia—the country’s entire constitution is an annex of the document—by cleaving it into two ethnically based “entities” of roughly equal size. These are the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, home predominantly to Bosniaks (Bosnian Muslims) and Bosnian Croats, and the Bosnian Serb–dominated Republika Srpska. Both entities have their own president, their own prime minister, and the trappings of extensive autonomy, with a weak central government in the federal capital Sarajevo presiding over them. There is no hard border, but Bosnia’s various communities largely live separate lives.
Besides the country’s presidency, Dodik has also for the past eight years led Republika Srpska, which encompasses much of the country’s north and east (Republika Srpska should not be confused with Serbia, a separate country with whom its people share ethnic, linguistic, and religious commonalities). He appears to have grand designs for the territory: like many Bosnian Serbs, Dodik views Republika Srpska as a state-in-waiting, whose full sovereignty is stymied only by the Dayton Accords, which clearly forbid its often postponed secession from Bosnia.
In October, Bosnians elected three members of the country’s presidency, each representing its main ethnic groups; the chairmanship of the presidency rotates between the trio. For the next eight months, it’s Dodik’s turn in the driver’s seat, and he has started in predictably inflammatory style. Before his inauguration in November, Dodik brought the flag of Republika Srpska to Sarajevo, where he planted it outside his new office in the presidency building. The act seemed calculated to spark anger, given that Republika Srpska has flirted with secession more than once. Politicians from the Bosniak and Croat communities demanded that the flag be removed. Dodik not only stood firm but upped the ante: If Republika Srpska’s flag was not displayed in the building, he said, he would refuse to hold presidency sessions.