Will Bosnia and Herzegovina split?
13 May 2025
Is it possible that we will soon have a new small country in Europe? Well, this is what some in Bosnia and Herzegovina are hoping for. Many believe Bosnia is facing its most serious political crisis since the war in the 1990s. The main reason for this is a growing push for secession in its Serb-majority region, Republika Srpska.
To begin with, the country has probably the weirdest and most complicated political institutional structure in Europe. The country is sliced into two main entities (one for Bosniaks and Croats and one for Serbs) and one special district (which is administered by both), all of them with high autonomy. The two entities have their parliaments, presidents and governments, while the district is a multi-ethnic administrative unit under state-level sovereignty.
There's more. At the state level, there's not one president, but three, one from each ethnicity, rotating every eight months. And just when you thought it couldn't get messier, enter the Office of the High Representative. This is an internationally-chosen overseer with superpowers – he can impose laws and remove elected officials. In short: the country's highest political authority is defined not by Bosnians but by the international community.
Its current holder, German CSU politician Christian Schmidt, recently flexed his muscle by cutting off public funding for the party of Milorad Dodik, the president of Republika Srpska, the Serb entity.
What was considered a turbulent political environment for many years now culminated in February 2025, when Dodik was convicted and sentenced to one year in prison and banned from holding the presidency for six years. The reason: defying the decisions of the High Representative. After this, lawmakers in Republika Srpska passed laws rejecting the central authority of Bosnia's judiciary and police.
Dodik also threatened to break ties with the central government and stop state prosecutors and intelligence agents from working in Republika Srpska. The Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina has since suspended these laws.
While secession is unlikely for the near future, because state divorces are never an easy matter, Dodik is on a mission to gain friends who could support his plans, like the Russian president Vladimir Putin or the American president Donald Trump.
 | Blerta Begisholli If Republika Srpska separates from Bosnia and Herzegovina, it would face serious problems. With a population of less than one million, the region would lose access to important resources and institutions, making it hard to trade or get help from other countries. This could increase ethnic tensions and cause people to be displaced or face human rights issues. The separation would also weaken the government, leading to problems in providing basic services, and the instability could force even more people to leave. |
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