Putin And Xi Will Help Us If You Crack Down, Bosnian Serb Leader Tells West

The Bosnian Serb leader accused of risking war by pursuing the breakup of Bosnia-Herzegovina has dismissed the threat of western sanctions and hinted at an imminent summit with Vladimir Putin, saying: “I was not elected to be a coward”.

- Daniel Boffey

In an interview with the Guardian, Milorad Dodik, the Serb member of the tripartite leadership of Bosnia-Herzegovina, said he would not be deterred by the outcry from London, Washington, Berlin and Brussels.

Dodik, 62, a key figure in Bosnian politics for 30 years, who was once a favourite of the west, said sanctions and cuts to EU funding would only force him to take up offers of investment from China, and he expected to see Russia’s leader “pretty soon”.

Dodik said: “When I go to Putin there are no requests. He just says, ‘what is it I can help with?’. Whatever I discussed with him, I’ve never been cheated on it. I don’t know what else to base trust upon, if not that. With [China’s leader] Xi Jinping, he also says, ‘if there is anything I can help with I am there’.”

Dodik has been widely condemned in recent weeks over his stated intention to withdraw the Serbian part of Bosnia-Herzegovina from state-level institutions, such as the tax administration, judiciary, intelligence agency and even the national army, in order to create a Serb force.The proposal was described in a report to the UN as tantamount to “secession”, and a risk to the 1995 Dayton peace accord, which ended the civil war after the break up of Yugoslavia. The war cost about 100,000 lives.