The session of the Appellate Chamber of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, where the Prosecutor’s Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the defense of the President of Republika Srpska Milorad Dodik will present their appeals against the verdict by which he was convicted of disobeying the decisions of the High Representative, has been postponed to 4:00 p.m. Dodik’s lawyer, Goran Bubić, requested the disqualification of the Chairwoman of the Chamber, Vesna Jesenkovič, and the member of the Chamber, Hilma Vučinić.
Bubić stated that “judges who previously participated in the case against the President of Republika Srpska Milorad Dodik cannot sit on the Chamber”.
“In December 2023, we filed a request for the delegation of the case from the Court of BiH to the court in Banja Luka and the Criminal Division rejected the request as untimely and you were one of the members of the Chamber”, said Bubić, addressing the Chairwoman of the Chamber.
According to the first-instance verdict of 26 February, Dodik was sentenced to one year in prison and a six-year ban from holding the office of President of the RS, while Miloš Lukić, acting director of the “Official Gazette of the RS”, was acquitted.
Dodik was found guilty because from 1 to 9 July 2023 in Banja Luka, knowingly and knowingly that the High Representative Christian Schmidt had issued a decision preventing the entry into force of the Law on Non-Application of Decisions of the Constitutional Court of BiH of 1 July of the same year, as well as the decision preventing the entry into force of the Law on Amendments to the Law on Publication of Laws and Other Regulations of the RS, he took actions with the aim of continuing the legislative procedure, without applying and not implementing the decisions of the High Representative.
Following the verdict, a political crisis erupted in Bosnia and Herzegovina, after the ruling coalition in the RS National Assembly adopted laws banning the operation of the State Court and Prosecutor’s Office, the High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council of BiH, and the State Investigation and Protection Agency (SIPA) in the territory of RS, which were later temporarily suspended by the Constitutional Court of BiH.
The Prosecutor’s Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina launched an investigation against Dodik and other leaders of the Republika Srpska entity for the criminal offense of “attack on the constitutional order”, and the Court of BiH ordered the detention of Dodik, as well as the Prime Minister of RS Radovan Višković and the President of the RS National Assembly Nenad Stevandić. The Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina later issued an arrest warrant, while the issuance of an Interpol arrest warrant was rejected, Srna writes.
