Brussels, 23/12/2004 (Agence Europe) - Following new sanctions launched by the international community on 16 December against the authorities of the Republika Srspka (one of the two bodies making up Bosnia Herzegovina, the other one being the Croat-Muslim Federation) for failure to cooperate with the International War Crimes Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague, the political crisis caused by mass resignation of Bosnian politicians of Serb origin (see Europe of 22 December p.5) eased off at the end of the week, but the international community is continuing to demand full cooperation with the war crimes tribunal. All the ministers who resigned are members of the Democratic Progress Party (DPP), but no politicians from the powerful nationalist Serb Democratic Party (SDS), a DPP ally, resigned. While the international community's sanctions, which included the sacking of six Bosnian Serb police commissioners by the international community's high representative, Paddy Ashdown, and a United States visa ban on DPP and SDS leaders, did not please the Bosnian Serb ministers, it was Ashdown's order to continue defence and police reforms that broke the camel's back. The Republika Srspka authorities and the Serb members of the central Bosnian government fiercely oppose reforms to strengthen central power at the expense of local autonomy. The prime minister of Bosnia Herzegovina, Muslim Adnan Terzic, played down the crisis, noting that his government could function with at least two representatives of each community, but added that cabinet meetings had been suspended until replacements had been found for the ministers who had resigned. Faced with determination from the international community to face down the mass resignations, Bosnian Serbs received support from Russia, which criticised Ashdown's measures, saying they would not encourage the authorities of Republika Srpska to cooperate more fully with the war crimes tribunal.