On 10th Anniversary of Dayton Accord: Are Changes in Bosnia Real or Rhetorical?

By Peter Lippman


	On Nov. 21, 2005, the 10th anniversary of the Dayton Accord, Bosnians ride a Sarajevo streetcar still bearing visible damage from the war. Under the window is painted the symbol of the European Union, which Bosnia hopes to join (AFP Photo Elvis Barukcic).

TEN YEARS ago, the international community midwifed a peace agreement that ended the three-and-a-half-year-long war in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The document, crafted at Dayton, Ohio, brought a halt to the war and established a state with two “entities”—the Serb-controlled Republika Srpska and the Muslim-Croat Federation. The Dayton agreement has worked well for those who led the war and are still leading the country. It also has worked well for some international officials. The only people for whom the Dayton arrangement has not worked well are the ordinary people of Bosnia.

In this 10th anniversary period, there has been much talk of rearranging the constitutional set-up of Bosnia along more rational lines. At the urging of the international community, Bosnia’s leaders over the past few months have promised to integrate their ethnically based armed forces and their police departments, placing the newly unified security forces under state jurisdiction. And there is much talk of “going to Europe,” i.e., eventual Bosnian membership in the European Union. Will anything come of it? And if so, will it help the Bosnians themselves, or just their leaders?

The Dayton agreement was an emergency measure whose most effective component was the imposition of a cease-fire on the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina where, over a period of nearly four years, tens of thousands were raped, tortured and killed, and around half the population of over four million was displaced. This bloody work was sponsored by the regimes of neighboring Serbia and Croatia. The ultimate goals of those who destroyed Bosnia were twofold: self-enrichment on a grand scale through the plundering of Bosnia’s wealth, and the annexation of most of Bosnia, whether through legal means or simply de facto. The first goal has been achieved, resulting in the mass impoverishment of Bosnians of all ethnicities, who once lived quite well. The verdict on the second goal is not yet in.

Although Bosnia was divided into two political entities, it is controlled militarily by three separate forces: Croat, Serb and Muslim. Each force dominated separate, more-or-less ethnically homogenized territories, and each had its own army, police force and intelligence service. Meanwhile, a million Bosnians had become refugees outside their country, with a similar number displaced internally. The Muslims were by far the greatest victims, but most Bosnians, regardless of ethnicity, lost their livelihoods, their identities, and their future.

In the ensuing period the international community pressured the various domestic authorities—many of whom had been, until recently, enthusiastic participants in the dismemberment of the country—to allow the return of refugees. Eventually laws were imposed that forced the return of some stolen property as well. Along the way, the international community’s High Representative removed a few of the more uncooperative public officials. The main lesson learned by the erstwhile separatists was that, if they wished to preserve their lucrative positions, they must repeat the phrases the international enforcers wanted to hear—such as “multi-culturalism,” “tolerance” and “rule of law.” They have learned that lesson well, indeed.

As of today, actual refugee return has been weak, and populations remain relatively homogenized by territory. This situation makes it easy for the extreme nationalists who run most of Bosnia to maintain an atmosphere of fear, and therefore retain power. These leaders have enriched themselves by legalizing the regime of corruption that flourished during the war, while maintaining an ever-more-polished façade of politeness and cooperation. Most disappointing of all, international officials have willingly played along, pretending along with the nationalist leaders that the latter have “reformed” and are interested in creating out of Dayton’s Frankensteinish contraption a country that operates rationally.

Meanwhile, around a fifth of the Bosnian population lives below the poverty line, three-fifths are unemployed, and two-thirds of the country’s youth say they would leave the country if given the chance.

Young people don’t have many other chances. If they can afford the books, they can go to school and earn university degrees. Earning a living is another matter, however, as the economy remains crippled, with production stagnating at a fraction of the pre-war level. Foreign investment remains low.

In the past year, pressure from the international community has resulted in some tentative changes that look promising. In August the Serb-controlled entity agreed to transfer jurisdiction over its armed forces to a joint state command. In the future there will be no Serb, Muslim, or Croat forces, just one Bosnian army—at least on paper. A potential problem, however, is that Bosnian army structures remain territorially based. Thus, their composition will reflect the ethnic make-up of a given territory. However, the agreement on military restructuring was sufficiently satisfactory to international officials for them to give Bosnia a green light for the next move toward eventual entry to NATO.

The move to unify police forces at a national level was much more difficult to press through. Serb obstruction was fierce, resulting in strong threats of sanctions from the international community. Only at the last moment did the Serbs cave in and agree to a vague arrangement that would “regionalize” police centers across entity lines. While this agreement satisfied international officials, it is so vague as to be unpromising.

All of these developments threaten Serb separatists who, while improving their civilized façade, have not lost sight of their original war goals. Focusing on what is most important to them—power and riches—they have sacrificed the goal of maintaining an “ethnically cleansed” territory and allowed some “minorities” to return to their pre-war homes, in what is now an apartheid situation. It even is conceivable that, since they no longer need him, they will sacrifice their most heroic fugitive, Radovan Karadzic. The arrest in early December of top Croatian fugutive Ante Gotovina heightens the pressure on Serb authorities for Karadzic’s apprehension.

To be fair, the corruption and political manipulation is not limited to Bosnia’s Serbs. Extreme nationalist Croats continue to promote the creation of a “third entity” for their own beleaguered population—a development that would spell the end of a reunified Bosnia. Nor is corruption foreign to the country’s Muslim leaders. The list of representatives of all three ethnicities who have been removed—or banned from travel to the United States—due to corruption or flouting Dayton continues to grow. It includes former presidents and prime ministers as well as members of the three-part state presidency. One of these, Ante Jelavic, was convicted of corruption and is now on the lam in neighboring Croatia.

Once the hurdle of police force unification was cleared, Bosnia was invited to participate in discussions on a Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA), the first step toward accession to the European Union. These discussions began in late November. Meanwhile, Bosnia’s domestic leaders are aware that, if their bid for accession to the EU is to be taken seriously, they will have to reform the state constitution. With a confounding and counterproductive 14 levels of government (Bosnia has well over 100 ministries), however, opportunities for obstruction and corruption are vast. It’s safe to predict that Brussels will turn its back on Bosnia until the country creates something that looks more like a workable government.

For Bosnians, “going to Europe” is something like going to heaven: one doesn’t know what it actually will be like, but it has to be much better than the present reality. For ordinary Bosnians, Europe means jobs, euros and good passports. For the profiteers who run the country, it could mean the end of their banditry—but they must present at least an appearance of sincerity and unanimity, lest they forfeit the present support and cooperation of the international community.

Thus, at least rhetorically, EU membership is the one thing on which everyone agrees. Indeed, it may be the one issue the outside world can use as leverage to influence the functioning of the Bosnian state—if, that is, the international community has the will. To date, much of the interaction between international and domestic officials has been a charade, with much hot air expelled over small changes. An example is the meeting of Bosnian party officials in Washington on Nov. 21, the anniversary of the Dayton agreement. There Bosnian politicians signed a vague agreement pledging to work in the coming months to redesign the political structure of Bosnia’s state government so as to strengthen the central government’s authority.

Despite the enthusiasm of U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns, however, there is nothing in the agreement to force the Serb-controlled entity to relinquish a significant part of its de facto sovereignty to the state—because that is where the Serb politicians draw the line.

“Moving to Europe”

The outcome of Bosnia’s move toward the EU depends on pressure from the international community. At this point it is possible that international officials will continue to turn a blind eye to the dysfunctional operation of the state, even though they know full well what is going on, and even though they understand the meaning behind the statements of Bosnia’s political operators. For example, when Croat member of the Bosnian presidency Ivo Miro Jovic says that the current constitution is an obstacle to building a modern country, he means that the constitution should allow for a third (Croatian) entity. When Bosnian Serb leaders state, as they did in Washington, that they will undertake “all possible measures and actions to find and apprehend” Radovan Karadzic, they mean that they will continue to do little more than talk about his arrest.

It will take years—perhaps a decade—for Bosnia to shape up sufficiently to join the EU. On the occasion of the first steps of this process, it would be appropriate for the international officials involved to leave the hypocrisy and self-serving charades behind so as to ensure that Bosnia arrives in Europe as a healthy country, one where young people have hope, and reconciliation has a real chance.

Peter Lippman is an independent human rights researcher based in Seattle.