Dayton Accords three decades ago, it ended the first war in Europe after 1945. That peace treaty still shapes political reality today Of Bosnia and Herzegovina. How did the agreement come about? What role did Germany play?
1. How did the Dayton Agreement come about?
Dayton Peace Accords was concluded in 1995 after almost four years of war in Bosnia and Herzegovina marked by ethnic cleansing, the siege of Sarajevo and massacres like the one in Srebrenica. They took diplomatic leadership United States, which led to a military coup in the summer of 1995: airstrikes NATO and the joint offensive of the Croatian Army, the HVO and the BiH Army put the Bosnian Serbs under strong pressure, he writes DW.
The then US President William Bill Clinton wanted to achieve foreign policy success before the 1996 elections. In intense "shuttle diplomacy" between Belgrade, Zagreb and Sarajevo, his mediator, American diplomat Richard Holbrooke, forced the conflicting parties to negotiate, bringing them together at the Wright Peterson US military base in Dayton, Ohio.
Why there? Due to complete isolation, due to the fact that there was no media, nor the possibility to "escape". Holbrooke's style was a combination of strong political pressure, tactical toughness, psychological games and pragmatic diplomacy. That's why he got the nickname "Bulldozer". There was tension and sleepless nights: Holbrooke described some scenes as "a war of nerves in the corridors".
On November 21, 1995, the presidents of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, and Serbia reached an agreement that preserved Bosnia and Herzegovina as a single state - but divided into two entities. This ended the war. The Dayton Agreement was signed on December 14 in Paris.
Neither side was satisfied. Holbrooke later said, "When everybody is unhappy, that's a real compromise."
2. What was the basis for the Dayton Agreement?
The basis for the Dayton Peace Agreement was the plan of the then Contact Group for BiH, which was based on the proposal Russia, Great Britain i France. That plan envisaged a de facto recognition of the expulsions and "ethnic cleansing" committed by Serbs under the leadership Radovan Karadžić, giving them 49 percent of the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina - although according to the 1991 census, only 31 percent of Serbs lived in the country.
Later, the resettlement of different ethnic groups was even accepted in order to create a more "homogeneous" ethnic area: the Republika Srpska with Serbs on the one hand and the Federation of BiH with Bosniaks and Croats on the other.
3. Who were the main actors?
The presidents sat at the negotiating table: Slobodan Milosevic (Serbia), Franjo Tudjman (Croatia) and Alija Izetbegovic (Bosnia and Herzegovina).
Each of them had their own interests in Bosnia and Herzegovina: Milošević wanted to secure influence and the territories conquered and ethnically cleansed by the Bosnian Serbs (Republika Srpska), Tuđman sought territorial advantages ("Herceg Bosnia"), and Izetbegović fought to preserve the state unity of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
With Radovan Karadzic or Ratko Mladić, the political and military representatives of the Bosnian Serbs, were not negotiated because they had already been indicted for war crimes before the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in 1995. In addition, the USA, the EU and NATO considered Milosevic a "key man" in the Serbian bloc. The Bosnian Serb war was not possible without political, financial, military and diplomatic support Of Serbia.
Croatian President Franjo Tuđman participated in the negotiations because Croatia was a key political and military actor on the side of the Bosnian Croats.
4. Why did the war break out in Bosnia and Herzegovina?
Bosnian War (1992–1995) broke out because the majority of the population of Bosnia and Herzegovina voted for independence in a referendum from February 29 to March 1, 1992. This was preceded by the first multi-party elections in 1990, in which the nationalist parties of Bosnian Muslims (Bosniaks), Bosnian Serbs and Bosnian Croats - SDA, SDS and HDZ - won.
This was possible because, after the death of the Yugoslav president Josip Broz Tito, there was the dissolution of the Yugoslav federation and the strengthening of nationalist movements. After Slovenia and Croatia separated in 1991, Bosnia and Herzegovina also declared independence on March 1, 1992.
The Bosnian Serbs under the leadership of Radovan Karadžić - with the support of Serbia and the Yugoslav Army - refused this. They proclaimed the Republic of the Serbian People in BiH and began to terrorize and expel the local non-Serb population (Bosniaks and Croats) from that area.
Nationalist leaders, such as Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic and Republika Srpska President Radovan Karadžić, spread hatred and fear, which led to ethnic cleansing, massacres and Siege of Sarajevo.
In the beginning, Bosniaks and Croats defended themselves together, but later a conflict broke out between them as well. The majority of Bosniaks and Serbs were expelled from the territory of the self-proclaimed Croatian Republic of Herceg-Bosnia - Mostar became a city divided between Croats and Bosniaks.
5. What was Germany's role in the Dayton Agreement?
Germany was part of the so-called Contact groups, together with the USA, Russia, Great Britain and France. That group coordinated diplomatic efforts to end the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Chancellor Helmut Kohl politically supported the negotiations and emphasized the importance of the agreement for the stability of Europe.
On the initiative of the USA, with the support of the German government, in January 1994, Tuđman and Izetbegović met at the Petersberg Hotel near Bonn. Those negotiations resulted in the Washington Agreement in March 1994, which ended the war between Bosniaks and Croats, abolished the Croatian Republic of Herceg-Bosna, established the Bosniak-Croat Federation, and appointed Hans Košnik as the EU administrator in Mostar.
The international community also established the function of the High Representative (OHR), which oversees the implementation of the civilian part of the Dayton Agreement. In January 1996, Berlin sent the German diplomat Michael Steiner to Sarajevo. He was the first deputy of the High Representative until July 1997. In 2006, former German post minister Christian Schwarz-Schilling took over the post of High Representative for a year and a half. As of August 1, 2021, the former German Minister of Agriculture, Christian Schmidt, will hold that post with headquarters in Sarajevo.
The key tools of the High Representative are the so-called "Bonn Powers", adopted in 1997 at the Bonn Conference. They give the High Representative the right to enact or repeal laws, as well as to remove elected officials if they obstruct the implementation of the Dayton Agreement.
6. Why is the Dayton Agreement criticized?
The agreement created a complex political order - Bosnia and Herzegovina consists of two entities: Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina i Republika Srpska, as well as the District Brcko. Such a structure was supposed to guarantee peace, but it created a complicated administration with three presidents, numerous ministries and an ethnically divided society. Decision-making processes are often blocked, making reforms difficult.
Critics point out that it was the Dayton Agreement that strengthened ethnic divisions and made it difficult to develop a functional state. Each ethnic group has territories that are inhabited by the majority and the right of veto - because of this, almost nothing gets decided. Ethno-nationalists who got rich during and after the war benefit the most from this. They constantly fuel fear and conflict, so that no one questions where money, power and resources actually end up. This is how old divisions persist, the state weakens - and citizens are blocked.
The Dayton Agreement essentially deprived all minorities of their democratic rights - they practically do not exist in the Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which defines only three ethnic groups (Bosniaks - Muslims, Croats and Serbs) as constituent nations. That deficiency was confirmed by the judgments of the European Court of Human Rights (e.g. by the judgments Sejdić-Finci, Zornić, Pilav). This erased the basic rights of many residents who do not want to declare themselves ethnically.
Source: DW
