The Member States of the European Union expressed differing preferences as to the best candidate to replace the current High Representative, Christian Schmidt, in Bosnia and Herzegovina, at the 4 and 5 June meeting of the Peace Implementation Council (PIC).
Germany and France supported the French candidate, René Troccaz, who was also backed by the United Kingdom, while Italy supported Antonio Zanardi Landi, also backed by the United States, according to a well-informed source, quoted by Agence Europe.
In a social media post on 4 June, the US mission in Sarajevo said that the United States was “disappointed ” by “Europeans’ inability to reach a consensus around a European candidate” to elect a new High Representative at the PIC meeting and could “reconsider its role in the current international presence in Bosnia and Herzegovina”.
In a recent interview with the German daily paper Augsburger Allgemeine, Christian Schmidt, who had earlier announced his intention to step down, acknowledged that “there had been considerable and surprising pressure from the United States”, of which the “motivations were not entirely clear” to him.
Annex X of the Dayton Peace Agreement created the Office of the High Representative (OHR) as the final authority responsible for interpreting the civilian aspects of implementation of the peace agreement. Since then, the OHR has been granted broad powers enabling it to impose laws and dismiss public officials – the “Bonn Powers” – powers which Christian Schmidt has notably used to impose constitutional amendments and electoral laws in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Such extensive international supervision is, in principle, incompatible with the full sovereignty of Bosnia and Herzegovina and, consequently, with its accession to the EU.
A process aimed at closing the Office of the High Representative has been under way since 2008. Its completion depends on a number of conditions, known as the ‘5+2 Agenda’, which the European Union considers have not yet been met. (Original version in French by Ana Pisonero Hernández)