The president of Our Party, Sabina Cudic, clarified details following the meeting at the Embassy of the United States (U.S.) in Sarajevo, which was attended by politicians from the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (FBiH) in order to discuss the Southern Gas Interconnection.
She pointed out that a series of next steps had been agreed upon concerning the dynamics of the realization and implementation of the project, such as the nomination of the state agreement between BiH and Croatia, which will be worked on by the Government of the FBiH and then forwarded to the Council of Ministers of BiH for consideration and adoption.
“Among other things, work will also be done on amendments and supplements to the Law on the Southern Interconnection in the Federation. Of course, as I said at this place last time as well, the devil is in the details. Regardless of the agreed dynamics in terms of deadlines, what interests us above all is the content of those amendments and supplements, which we will work on in the coming months. What is also important is the concession commissions at the level of the FBiH and other technical details, but what is most important, what we insisted on, was achieved this time. We received a clear signal from the U.S. administration and the U.S. Embassy in Sarajevo that this project will not and must not be tied to any political concessions to any actors in BiH,” she explained.
She said that this is crucial because there had been attempts to link this project to certain political goals, even in the U.S. Congress.
“What we received are guarantees that no attempts at political profiteering will in any way be tolerated from something that should be a mutual economic benefit for the U.S. and BiH, and that this project should remain in the sphere of the economy, not politics. At all meetings with U.S. officials, we always underline that the fastest way for this project not to happen, to fail, is if it is tied to political goals and if we see that in any way political concessions are being made or granted, I would say, to some destructive demands of individuals,” she added.
She emphasized that this part has been overcome, and that the more important question is how to ensure diversification of the gas network for BiH citizens, lower gas prices in the long term, and a form of security stabilization.
Asked by journalists about the amendments to the law, she replied that blockades and games used for political purposes will not be tolerated.
She stated that the meeting was mostly technical in nature, with far fewer political messages compared to the previous meeting.
“It is a huge infrastructure project… It can see a large percentage of the works carried out in that year. It does not depend only on BiH; a small part of that project also depends on Croatia,” Cudic concluded.
