EXPERTS IN PARIS ANALYZED ACHIEVEMENTS OF DAYTON AGREEMENT, ROUNDTABLE WAS GREAT SUCCESS

PARIS, DECEMBER 4 /SRNA/ - A roundtable was held in Paris at which experts from Republika Srpska, the region, and France analyzed the achievements of the Dayton Agreement, the current political challenges in BiH, the role of the entities as signatories to the Agreement, and the future of the Balkans in the context of European integration.

The Head of the Republika Srpska Representative Office in Paris Bojana Kondić Panić told SRNA that this was an opportunity to look at three decades of implementing the Dayton Agreement and the challenges of the present moment from an academic perspective, without political connotations, through the analyses of historians, professors, legal experts, and researchers. "Our goal was to create space for a well-argued, academic discussion on peace, the constitutional framework, and BiH’s prospects, including the question of the position of the entities as contracting parties to the peace agreement," Panić said. According to her, BiH today is a battleground of differing views and interpretations of the Dayton Peace Agreement, both within the country and in the international community, which is why they chose to organize a gathering in Paris, not far from where the agreement was signed, to enable an objective and expert assessment of its significance. The roundtable, titled "Thirty Years After Dayton: Peace, Challenges, and Perspectives," brought together around 200 Paris-based students, professors, members of the diplomatic corps, business representatives, writers, historians, journalists, lawyers, and representatives of various organizations. Panić assessed that the event was highly successful and exceeded all expectations of the organizers, expressing satisfaction with the attention the topic received and the large number of participants. She expressed her belief that it is important to speak about such issues from a neutral, professional, and responsible standpoint. The event opened with remarks by French Senator and former Mayor of the 16th Arrondissement, Francis Szpiner. Distinguished experts from France and the region - political scientist Nina Sajić, geopolitics professor Alexis Trude from the Université de Melun–Val de Seine, Neven Cvetićanin from the Institute of Social Sciences in Belgrade, historian Edward Huson from Sorbonne University, and international law professor Dragan Dakić - participated in the discussion. "We are particularly pleased that among the audience were students of political science and international law from universities such as Sciences Po /the Paris Institute of Political Studies/ and the Sorbonne, as well as professors, researchers, and prominent French citizens who are not originally from our region but showed great interest in this topic," Kondić Panić emphasized. As part of the commemoration of three decades since the signing of the Dayton Peace Agreement, an exhibition of historical photographs from the signing ceremony, created by Milovan Ćirovski, was presented. The event, organized by the Representative Office of Republika Srpska in France and Balkan Media, was held at the City Hall of the 16th arrondissement.