ŠPIRIĆ: REPUBLIKA SRPSKA DOES NOT WANT TO BE DUMPING GROUND FOR FAILED INTERNATIONAL PROJECTS

SARAJEVO, SEPTEMBER 24 /SRNA/ – The Chairman of the House of Peoples of the BiH Parliamentary Assembly Nikola Špirić conveyed to EU Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos the position of Republika Srpska that BiH's path toward the EU is not a purely bureaucratic matter, that Srpska has the right to be a subject of decision-making in BiH, not an object for the implementation of Sarajevo's political wishes and a dumping ground for failed international projects.

After the meeting of the Joint Collegium of both houses of the BiH Parliamentary Assembly with Kos, Špirić told SRNA that he pointed out that Republika Srpska wants to participate and to decide. He added that Republika Srpska is not preparing secession, does not threaten the territorial integrity of BiH, and is not a destabilizing factor in terms of security. "Those are many others who have spread various lies about the situation in BiH outside of BiH. Unfortunately, those lies have reached Brussels and come from Brussels, because we see that certain bureaucrats are making statements in line with the platform of the Sarajevo political troika," Špirić emphasized. At the meeting, Špirić underlined that Republika Srpska stands for the rule of law. "It was an opportunity for me to say that yes, we are for the rule of law, but I would also like an answer as to whether the rule of law means having an unelected foreigner who imposes laws, who suspends the Constitution for a day, who has produced great instability within BiH—and since when is that called the rule of law. I conveyed that we must also resolve the issue of foreign judges in the BiH Constitutional Court," Špirić said. He stressed that Republika Srpska is fighting for sovereign decision-making within BiH's institutions of authority and wants to discuss all open issues. "In order to strike at SNSD, political Sarajevo has blocked all processes, sending messages that with SNSD there is no European path. And that is the lie that has been entrenched for quite some time - almost a year, even longer—and which is tried to be legitimized outside BiH," Špirić warned. He stated that his colleagues were asking Kos to support a pro-European coalition without SNSD. "That is not Brussels' job. The legitimacy of SNSD was given by voters in elections, and that will remain the case until the next elections and the search for new legitimacy," Špirić declared. He believes that Kos understood that interference of Brussels in BiH's internal affairs, which are solely a matter of internal dialogue, was a step outside the framework of what can actually help BiH.