In the spring, Bosnia and Herzegovina should receive the status of a candidate for joining NATO. This is a new category introduced for aspiring member states. There was never a consensus on NATO membership in Bosnia and Herzegovina, but somehow the country traced its way to the Alliance. How to proceed without consensus?
At the spring session of NATO, our country should receive the status of a candidate for joining the Alliance. If this happens, it will be the first time that NATO assigns this status to a country, because until now the countries were in the status of negotiators before full membership. In our country, this status is seen as a step closer to the Alliance and an opportunity to improve cooperation.
“It will be much more transparent, more open in partnership relations with the Ministry of Defense. Our soldiers were on peacekeeping missions. Now everything will somehow intensify, which tells me that our path will accelerate and that we could even be the next member after Sweden”, believes Dijana Gupta, a professor at the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Džemal Bijedić Mostar.
“Obtaining the candidate status of Bosnia and Herzegovina for NATO is actually a great recognition of the state and the Armed Forces of Bosnia and Herzegovina in the reforms we have achieved in the past ten years. This invitation will mean a step closer to Bosnia and Herzegovina for that entry”, points out military-political analyst Đuro Kozar.
And while there are unequivocal messages from Jens Stoltenberg, the Secretary General of NATO, that the Alliance is ready to welcome us into its fold if citizens and politicians want it, the question arises: Are we ready to be part of NATO?
“We are not ready to enter now. We are not a prepared country to be a member, but in the coming period, if there is a desire, it can be completed”, assesses Kozar.
There are desires and there are none. As expected, views on this and many other issues differ from entity to entity. Expected messages from the RS: we are ready for cooperation, but not for membership.
“There is nothing from NATO. Until we within Bosnia and Herzegovina come to an agreement. There can be talk about NATO when a consensus is reached within Bosnia and Herzegovina. Until then, there is no talk about NATO. In other words, there is cooperation, there is defined cooperation and we will move within that,” says Nenad Nešić, Minister of Security of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“I am glad that we are the subject of NATO’s interest. We are certainly closer to NATO than before”, says Elmedin Konaković, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“Bosnia and Herzegovina needs NATO more than the European Union, given the circumstances and geopolitical positions in our environment. I believe that NATO is a strategic interest of Bosnia and Herzegovina”, states Ilija Cvitanović, a delegate in the House of Peoples of the PSBiH.
Necessary or not, it seems that the status of candidate for NATO, which our country should receive, will not change much, because there is evidently no agreement. On the other hand, warnings that European and world officials will not wait forever for BiH politicians.
“This time we are all invited, if this is really activated in the spring, to implement it. A call to politics, especially the one that is now in a position, that we must no longer be a country on hold even when it comes to NATO and the EU. Quite simply, this all needs to come to life in reality, because I think that this is also the last train that Bosnia and Herzegovina is taking”, assesses Gupta.
Our country’s NATO journey began in 2005 with the adoption of the Law on Defense. A year later, the then chairman of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Nebojša Radmanović, a member of the SNSD, signed the Partnership for Peace Agreement, which was the first step towards NATO. Although messages are coming from the RS today against the NATO path, defense sector reforms, and representatives of this entity are participating in it. And the position of the state officially remained the same – NATO remains a strategic goal. But, it seems, it is difficult to reach the goal without shortcuts and privileges, Federalna reports.
