Serbs in Bosnia "closely watching" Scottish referendum

Source: AFP, Tanjug

Bosnian Serbs are "closely watching Scotland's independence referendum," the French agency AFP is reporting on Monday.

According to this, they are hoping that if Scots vote to break away from Britain "it would set a precedent that could boost their own chances of proclaiming a separate state."
President of the Serb entity, Serb Republic (Republika Srpska, RS) Milorad Dodik "has not hesitated to evoke the spectre of separation," in the wake of Crimea split from Ukraine and joined Russia following a disputed referendum in March, said the agency, and quoted him as saying:

"We are following what is going on in Italy (South Tyrol), in Scotland and even in Catalonia. These are crucial experiences for the RS."

But according to the article, "In multi-ethnic Bosnia, with the bloody legacy of its 1992-1995 war during the breakup of the former Yugoslavia, observers say talk of independence also raises the danger of a new armed conflict."

The article noted that Serbs boycotted Bosnia's 1991 referendum to break away from Yugoslavia which was successful thanks to the votes of Muslims and Croats, but that the independence came after a war that broke out in 1992 "pitting Serbs against Muslims and Croats" and claiming more than 100,000 lives.

The peace agreement reached in Dayton, Ohio in 1995 created the Serb entity, and the Muslim-Croat Federation (FBiH), both described as "highly autonomous and inked by a loose central government in charge of foreign matters, finance and defense."

To this day many Serbs have never really accepted the new post-war Bosnian state, despite the level of autonomy they have in the RS, said the French agency, and quoted Miloš Šolaja, professor of international relations at the University of Banja Luka:

"If a referendum was organized tomorrow, most of the Serbs would be in favor of independence. The RS has gradually become a solid political entity that most of its inhabitants, Serbs, identify with."

Šolaja was also quoted as saying that he thought "secession was not realistic at this moment" but that the RS is "de facto already a state given its huge statehood attributes."

Ahead of the October 12 elections Dodik made talk about independence "part of his campaign speeches," while the main Muslim party, the SDA, said that "Bosnia will never be put into question."

High Representative Valentin Inzko, however, was quoted as saying that "the country's constitution allows no possibility for either entity to secede":

Radio Free Europe analyst Dragan Štavljanin told AFP that Dodik's statements "amount to electoral rhetoric," but added there would be "a much stronger reaction if the threat of independence became more concrete."

"I believe that it could not happen without a new war in Bosnia," he said, and added that "such a conflict would risk attracting Muslim extremists who, as they did in the 1990s, would come to help fellow Muslims in Bosnia."

The agency also quoted Hajrudin Caluk, "a Muslim and Bosnian war veteran," as saying that "Serb separatist politics paralyse the functioning of the state," and an unnamed European diplomat in Sarajevo who said the situations in Bosnia and Britain were "completely different as the September 18 Scottish referendum was to be held with the consent of the British government."