European Perspective Needs to Overtake Narrow Dayton Accords Vision for Bosnia & Herzegovina to Succeed - See "Film Report" of Ambassador Muhamed Sacirbey Presenting at Harriman Institute/Columbia University, Parts 1-5 at www.diplomaticallyincorrect.org Dayton Accords & Process: Past The Dayton Accords were supposed to be Bosnia & Herzegovina’s (BiH) way from conflict and ethnic cleansing to reintegration and the Euro-Atlantic family. After all, why should Bosnian/Herzegovinians and particularly the BiH delegation in Dayton for the negotiations have thought any differently? We were surrounded by the symbolism of American might and right at Wright Air Force Base and induced by the rhetoric that BiH would be guided in the process by the same political values of open, democratic European states. Europe was also more than adequately represented, from the old historical imperial powers to the economic might of Germany. (Soon after Dayton, an elaborate tour of European capitals – London, Paris, Bonn and Brussels – was staged to imprint a European signature upon what some strived to call the “Dayton-Paris” or simply “Paris Accords” for the place where such were actually signed -they were only initialed in Dayton). It started to go wrong almost from the outset. As one who was there, I was witness not to a process guided by a European perspective or American ideals. Old prejudices complementing expediency allowed Milosevic’s Belgrade and to a degree Tudjman’s nationalism to define much of today’s Bosnia & Herzegovina. The representatives of the western democracies allowed, facilitated the false choice to be delivered to the BiH delegation: physical survival and of the state or continue the fight for values of pluralism that may be shared but with our indifference at best and with our potential animosity at worst. Looking Forward: the Right Questions It is important not to get stuck looking back but to have a forward perspective. As such, it is also critical to ask the right questions and not just those that have convenient answers for all of us who participated in and must hold some responsibility for Dayton. · Have the Dayton Accords been implemented in their most essential points, particularly those that would have brought BiH closer to the Euro-Atlantic family? · Is there a will now to implement them as such? · Has so-termed Dayton implementation become guided as much or more by old and new fears of the “Muslims” as the necessity to Europeanize Republika Srpska? · Better if OHR (Office of High Representative)is adapted to fulfill a pre-adopted goal of bringing BiH fully into the EU? (and NATO?) · Is status quo a dangerous co-dependency – US and EU officials get to blame “all sides” and thus absolve themselves of current responsibility or historical accountability while BiH parties defer to “outside powers” to resolve major issues? - (Term of OHR in BiH is unprecedented – compare to Iraq). · Has OHR become also a convenient substitute to face true obstacles to EU and NATO integration of BiH or even an indefinite, expedient alternative? · Can BiH survive if it remains ethnically/territorially divided and whose objectives does status quo serve? · Why did I withdraw my signature from Dayton Accords? Proposition - OHR should be closed in favor of an EU representative office with expanded authority to reach the pre-adopted mandate of integrating BiH into EU within a designated time frame. (If EU does not want to make such commitment than why should Bosnians/Herzegovinians tolerate European rule and frequently arbitrariness under guise of OHR?) - All issues between BiH parties should be subject to negotiation and resolution only guided by the principle of being consistent with BiH’s European perspective. - The “Cyprus Model” can be applied in the event of obstruction by a party to such European perspective goals.