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Bosnia ‘Lost Enthusiasm’ for EU, Dodik Claims

September 17, 201810:44
In a rare interview with a UK newspaper, Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik says his country is disillusioned with Europe – and the feeling appears to be mutual.
 The President of the Republic of Serbian entity in Bosnia and Herzegovina Milorad Dodik in the Bosnian Serb town of Banja Luka, Bosnia, 2016. Photo: EPA/VLADIMIR STOJKOVIC

In an interview published at the weekend by the pro-Conservative British newspaper Daily Telegraph, Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik said populism and divisions within Europe over immigration, Russia and America had weakened the EU’s appeal to the people of Bosnia.

Bosnians remained “very thankful” for Europe’s financial aid over the years, the President of Republika Srpska, the Serb-led entity of Bosnia, said. “Our problems would have been even bigger had it not been for this help,” he recalled.

However, Dodik maintained that “all of us, including Europe and us, have lost enthusiasm for this project.

“We were naïve to think that we would just join Europe and all our problems would go away.”

Dodik, described in the Telegraph as an admirer of Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump and Hungary’s Viktor Orban, went on to tell the staunchly pro-Brexit newspaper that he saw Britain’s exit from the European Union as a template for his entity’s own eventual exit from Bosnia.

But he dismissed talk of aiming to do this by force, by “building an army and partnering with Russian-trained nationalist paramilitaries”, as the Telegraph put it, referring to earlier media reports.

“My goal is peace,” Dodik said, adding: “If there was a way for Republika Srpska to get out of Bosnia in a peaceful way, through an agreement, we would certainly take it.”

The newspaper noted that Dodik had long ago lost the favour of his former Western patrons, noting that he has “reinvented himself as a hardline nationalist and is feared by some as a would-be warlord.”

However, the newspaper that said his description of “mutual disillusion” between Europe and the non-EU Balkan states was “hard to fault” – given that the EU had consistently rebuffed would-be member states in the Balkans since allowing in Slovenia and Croatia – and in June had postponed the start of accession talks with Albania and Macedonia.

It described this French-led decision as “infuriating… for advocates of the European project in the Balkans”.

Turning to Bosnia, the paper called the appearance of prosperity in the capital, Sarajevo, deceptive, as many of the new malls appears to cater mainly to foreign Middle Eastern tourists and second-home owners, while the country had one of the emigration and highest youth unemployment rates in Europe.

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