Bodo Weber, political analyst and senior associate of the Council for Democratization Policy, said on Sunday that the election of the Entity Government of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina on April 28, through two interventions by High Representative Christian Schmidt, on October 2, 2022 and April 27 this year, completed cycle of Western policy towards Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“The circle of the West’s low-intensity policy, dramatic abandonment of red lines and political principles, has ended,” Weber said at the regular session of “Circle 99” on the topic of “Western policy towards Bosnia and Herzegovina after the formation of the government”.
He added that both interventions of the high representative had desirable but also contradictory effects, i.e. the contribution to “functionality” was short-term, while the decisions “caused enormous damage to democracy and the rule of law”.
He added that in parallel with that, the EU institutions, by extraordinary granting of candidate status to Bosnia and Herzegovina, gave a gift to the new ruling coalitions and declared them reformist in advance.
“The question is what will be the dynamics after the formation of the government. How will the domestic government act on one side and on the other, what will be the policy of the West in that context towards Bosnia and Herzegovina,” said Weber.
Adil Kulenović, president of “Circle 99”, said that what they would call the Western policy towards the Balkans represents in its operational implementation and result the stopping and blocking of the democratic transition, yielding to old ethno-nationalist aspirations and “indulging in triple great-state expansionism”.
“Our trust in the value of civil order and Western democratic values will not be shaken. Because this is the future of Bosnia and Herzegovina regardless of obstacles and setbacks and the expression of the century-old, majority Bosnian aspiration towards a permanent support for peace and free development,” Kulenović said.
