KARAN: SRPSKA FIRMLY RESISTING UNITARY BiH

BANJA LUKA, NOVEMBER 21 /SRNA/ – Republika Srpska is firmly resisting, through the strength of its institutions, the creation of a unitary BiH where the Serb people would have no subjectivity, statehood or participation in decision-making, but would instead become a national minority, professor of constitutional law Siniša Karan told SRNA.

Karan states Republika Srpska has stable institutions, which alone are capable of adequately responding to the challenges that Srpska has been exposed to for the past 30 years. "It is the right and the obligation of the institutions to protect the Constitution, the constitutional order and all human rights guaranteed to citizens, but also to build and develop Republika Srpska for a better life of its citizens," Karan emphasized in SRNA podcast. He pointed out that the strength of Republika Srpska is based on several foundations that enable it to successfully withstand incredible pressures and attacks on its constitutional-legal order and its state-forming position. "Republika Srpska brought into BiH its entire constitutional-legal capacity, which by definition is absolutely equal to a state, and then that capacity was undermined in various ways. One of the key defence has been the strength of its institutions," Karan said. He recalled that the attacks were diverse, ranging from attempts to transfer the Republika Srpska property to the BiH level, to the attacks on basic family values and identity. "They have been extracting elements of statehood; the key element of statehood is territory, and territory is property. If you take away the territory, then by definition you are no longer a state. The key pillar of a state is state authority, represented by institutions with the will of the people behind them. When you remove that element of state authority, you automatically decapitate the people from what was a state, who become just an amorphous mass," Karan said. He stated that the Bosniak political elite, supported by the international community until the arrival of the new US administration, had been working toward the unitarization of BiH, practically transforming BiH into a Bosniak state in which the Serb people would become a national minority. "When you cannot participate in state-level authority, you no longer have efficient mechanisms to protect your identity, and by that I mean religion, education, history, language, and everything else. When you break that apart, you are breaking the statehood of a people," Karan warned. He emphasized that Republika Srpska is the framework for the survival of the Serb people, who throughout history was bringing freedom to others, while those same others later undermined the identity of Serbs to the point of attempting to physically destroy it. "Republika Srpska is the answer derived from historical memory, ensuring that such a thing never happens to the Serb people again. Freedom is the most precious Serb word, for which the Serb people has made tremendous sacrifices," Karan said.