European Forum

Bosnian Government formation fails

On September the 6th, the new round of talks in Mostar between six major political parties to finally form a central Bosnian government have failed. The results from the elections that were held on the third of October  almost a year ago have so far not been translated in to a workable council of ministers as a result of ethnic strife for the most important positions in combination with a landmark ruling by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).

The gaps that separate the six parties - the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats (SNDS), the Serbian Democratic Party (SDS), The Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), HDZ 90, the Party of Democratic Action (SDA), and the Social Democratic Party of Croatia (SDP) - once again run along ethnic lines. The war that destroyed the historic Stari Most bridge was brought to an end by the Dayton peace agreements, which still serve as a constitution for Bosnia and Herzegovina. According to these agreements, all three so-called constituent peoples (the Bosnians, the Croats, and the Serbs) have a claim to a certain number of seats in the Council of Ministers. However, it is not stipulated who will get which seats, and a crisis has arisen around the prestigious positions of chairman and minister of foreign affairs.

The talks are further complicated by the Sejdic and Finci ruling (Full text) by the EHCR. In this ruling, the court found the rules in the Dayton peace agreements with regards to the division of seats in the different structures of the Bosnian government discriminatory. The case was brought before the court by members of the Roma and Jewish minorities, who were unable to run for a seat in parliament because they were not member of one of the constituent peoples. The parties in Mostar seemed unwilling to yield one or more seats in the council of ministers to the unrepresented minority groups in Bosnia.

A new general meeting is scheduled for the fifteenth of September. In the meantime, bilateral and multilateral are continuing, and the possibility of rotating seats is being discussed. Božo Ljubić, leader of HDZ 90 and co-host of the failed talks, said that the talks represent the beginning of the recovery from the political crisis.

Sources: B92, Balkaninsight, EJIL. Image: Flickr