US Intel: Balkans threaten European stability

The top U.S. intelligence official warned Tuesday that persistent ethnic tensions in Bosnia pose the biggest challenge to maintaining stability in Europe.

Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair said in written testimony to lawmakers that animosities among the Balkan nation's Croat, Muslim and Serb factions are on the rise, and a hardening of their divergent agendas could threaten the stability of the fragile state.

Bosnia remains divided into ethnic ministates _ a Serb republic and a Muslim-Croat federation _ that were established in 1995 under the Dayton agreement that ended a bitter 3 1/2-year civil war. It is under the leadership of a multiethnic government whose leaders clash regularly over what the country should look like.

Blair said Bosnian Serbs has been reversing some of the changes included in the accord as part of efforts to seek more autonomy for their ministate. This, Blair said "is contributing to growing interethnic tensions." At the same time the Bosnian Muslims and Croats want to abolish the country's division so it can progress toward EU membership, Blair said.

"While neither widespread violence nor a formal breakup of the state appears imminent, ethnic agendas still dominate the political process, and reforms have stalled because of wrangling among the three main ethnic groups," Blair said.

Kosovo, whose Serb minority and ethnic Albanian majority remain at a tense standoff over the still-divided northern sector, also requires continuing US and European attention to maintain stability, Blair said.