EUFOR CONCERN
His comments sparked an angry reaction from Bosniak leaders, who said the VRS had been mentioned in many verdicts by the Hague-based international war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia as a force responsible for killing Bosniaks during the wars of the 1990s.
EUFOR, which in 2004 took over from NATO the task of keeping the peace in Bosnia, said: “Any statements which serve to undermine the AFBiH and their legal status as the single, united, military force of the state of Bosnia are counter-productive and should be avoided.
“EUFOR ... rejects any statements or activities that could divide this organization and jeopardize the success that AFBiH has achieved in terms of providing a single, state-level, and internationally respected military force, which represents all people of Bosnia and Herzegovina,” it said in a statement.
The U.S. Embassy in Sarajevo and the mission of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) also criticized Dodik’s statement, saying it was irresponsible and dangerous.
Bosniak leaders have accused Dodik of arming and beefing up the Serb region’s police, violating the balance of arms between the country’s two regions as agreed under the Dayton peace deal.
EUFOR, whose mandate is to support local authorities in maintaining a stable and secure environment and has around 800 troops deployed in Bosnia, has said it is prepared to intervene at short notice if violence resumes in Bosnia, two decades after the end of an ethnic conflict that killed 100,000 people.
sputniknews.com
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