Kallas: International Supervision in Place until Bosnia and Herzegovina Takes Full Responsibility for Decision-Making

Kaja Kallas (BETAPHOTO/MILOS MISKOV)

The European Union’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Kaja Kallas said in Butmir, near Sarajevo, on Nov. 3 that international supervision in Bosnia and Herzegovina should be phased out once the country’s authorities demonstrated the potential to make decisions.

“This means that we in the European Union want domestic institutions to take full responsibility for governing the country and making decisions, because this is your country, and thirty years after the war, there is no need for the international community to constantly intervene,” Kallas said at the EUFOR headquarters in Butmir, where she was welcomed by the commander of the EUFOR Althea Mission, Major General Florin-Marian Barbu, the Sarajevo-based portal Klix.ba. reported.

The EU official stated that the Union would now focus on implementing reforms crucial for progress, or rather those related to the functioning of state institutions in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Kallas recalled that the European Commission would publish its enlargement report tomorrow, noting that it will contain “certain negative elements for Bosnia and Herzegovina,” mainly regarding the implementation of two key reforms necessary for the country to make progress on its path to the EU.

She also said that the EUFOR would not allow any security risks in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and that the Union was doing everything possible to prevent a security vacuum in the country.

“We will not allow history to repeat itself,” Kallas told in her address to the EUFOR personnel at their base in Butmir, adding that “challenges to territorial integrity must not go unanswered, especially in Europe,” Sarajevo’s daily Avaz quoted the EU senior official as saying.