Presidency Chairman says Serbia's defence strategy could affect peace in region

Predsjedništvo BiH

Adoption of Serbia's Strategy for Defence and National Security would affect the peace and stability in the region and would mean an introduction into new tensions on the Western Balkan territory, Bosnia's Presidency Chairman Zeljko Komsic told Fena news agency, commenting on a document that was presented in Serbian Parliament on Tuesday.

According to him, adoption of this document would mean an act of “open hostility towards the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina.”

Komsic said it was Serbian President's duty to immediately suspend the Strategy before “it gets too late,” adding that the “wounds Bosnia has from the latest Serbian aggression and the committed genocide are still fresh.”

“They can be sure we will not allow that to happen again,” he underlined.

Serbian Defence Minister Aleksandar Vulin presented on Tuesday a document, which among other things say that the preservation of Bosnia's Serb-majority entity, Republika Srpska, is among Serbia's top foreign affairs priorities.

The minister said while presenting the document that this was not only a defence strategy but also a foreign policy strategy of Serbia.

It consists of seven elements, which emphasise the military neutrality and the care about all Serbs no matter where they live.

But, Bosnia's Presidency Chairman recalled that Serbia is a legal successor of the Socialist Republic Yugoslavia, one of the signatory of the Dayton Peace Agreement (DPA), a treaty which ended the Bosnian 1992-95 war.

With that signature, Serbia got obliged to recognise and respect Bosnia's sovereignty and its territorial integrity, having no competencies over Bosnia. It also got obliged to a number of elements that are, according to Komsic, completely opposite to the Strategy's part concerning military and defence aspect.

“If they in Serbia plan to give up the Dayton Peace Agreement, they should tell so. It will be our pleasure to arrange the things in Bosnia and Herzegovina in a different way,” said Komsic.

He recalled that among the Dayton Peace Agreement's signatories are some of the top NATO member states, noting that they would “put an end to Serbia's fantasies.”

“They will come real soon on the border at Drina river (Bosnia-Serbia border) in order to stop such Serbia's fantasies. Bosnia and Herzegovina should and will become a NATO member state exactly because of the plans in Serbia that show aspirations towards a part of the territory of the soevereign state of Bosnia and Herzegovina,” he said.