Bosnia Issues New Nationwide Arrest Warrant for Milorad Dodik: International Watch Escalates

The Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina has announced a countrywide arrest warrant for Milorad Dodik along with two other individuals. This move comes following the president of Bosnia’s Serb-majority Republika Srpska region who disregarded a national-level warrant just last week.

The remaining two individuals mentioned are Entity Prime Minister Radovan Višković and National Assembly Speaker Nenad Stevandić. This arrest warrant indicates that law enforcement officers across the nation are required to apprehend these individuals upon sighting them without delay.

All of them are charged with actions against constitutional order. According to Bosnian media reports, Stevandić has departed for Serbia.

The state-level prosecutors of Bosnia have issued arrest warrants for the three individuals. last week , which has not been implemented.

Dodik hasn't made any comments regarding the latest warrant yet. However, he has shared on X that Republika Srpska is initiating measures to establish its own border police. The role of this force would be to oversee the boundary separating the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina from Republika Srpska, which are both constituent parts of the nation.

Dodik, who had earlier stated that he doesn’t recognize the authority of the country’s state-level prosecutor's office, dismissed the legitimacy of last week’s warrants and any effort to apprehend him. He also declared that he won't travel to Sarajevo for an interrogation.

In late February, Bosnia's state-level court found Dodik guilty for defying the decisions made by the country’s international peace envoy, Christian Schmidt, an action deemed illegal under the law. However, this ruling isn’t set in stone as Dodik has the option to contest it through an appeal process.

Soon afterward, Dodik implemented new legislation aimed at prohibiting the functioning of state-level security and judicial bodies across roughly half of the Western Balkan nation's area.

The decisions have been temporarily suspended by the state-level Constitutional Court.

EUFOR, the European peacekeeping mission in Bosnia, announced an increase in troop numbers due to rising tensions in the region.