At the NATO Parliamentary Assembly session in Dayton, Croatian Foreign Minister Gordan Grlić Radman addressed, among others.
In his address, Grlić Radman said that the Dayton Peace Agreement brought peace to Bosnia and Herzegovina, but that the goals of stability and reconciliation were not met.
“Listen to me with an open mind and heart. I will say something that is neither new nor unheard of, but is often rejected because of the comfort found in simplifying complex historical and national problems,” said Grlić Radman.
He continued by saying that Croatia was among the first to recognize the independence of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and received more than a million refugees from our country. He also spoke about how
“Croatia ceded its territory for humanitarian aid regardless of the conflicts between Bosniaks and Croats.” He added that “Croatia turned the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina around,” and that due to the engagement of the Croatian army, “the Srebrenica scenario was prevented in Bihać.”
“I am not saying this to belittle the courage of the Bosnian soldiers, but they were accompanied by brave Croatian soldiers, who had the will and means to force the Serbian leaders to peace negotiations. Without us, there would have been no peace negotiations and the Dayton Peace Agreement would not have happened if it had not been for Croatia,” he said.
The Croatian Foreign Minister then said that separatism was singled out as a threat in the international community, but he also expressed the view that “hegemonic unitarism” was an equal threat to Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“Bosnian Croats cannot exercise their constitutional right and elect a legitimate representative to the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina four times. The spirit of the Dayton Peace Agreement is that each people elects its own representatives. For Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina, it is crucial who represents them, not what their ethnicity is. Legitimacy comes from the trust of the community, not from the mathematical majority of another people. The right to representation is not a privilege, but a condition for stability and peace,” said Grlić-Radman.
He repeated the frequent claims of politicians from Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, primarily from the HDZ, that “the call for a civil order is actually a call for the domination of the most numerous people”, and that “the international community must understand this and stand behind the federal model”, which Grlić-Radman sees as a “reaction to separatism and unitarism.”
Finally, he said that “foreign interventionism will not bring stability”, and that it will “destroy the balance in the sharing of power between the three constituent peoples.”
“I do not doubt your good intentions, but moves without a true understanding of the situation can only bring trouble”, is the message of the head of Croatian diplomacy, Klix.ba writes.
