"Sarajevo Commission" creates political trouble

The fate of Serbs in Sarajevo during the war has long been a contentious issue in Bosnia and Herzegovina. With legislative elections four months down the road in October, the issue threatens to paralyze the country's institutions, even though the president of the Council of Ministers, Adnan Terzic, agreed on May 25 to set up a special commission to investigate the fate of all Sarajevo citizens, including Serbs, who disappeared during the war. In the past, authorities in Serbian majority Republika Srpska, trying to equate the crimes in Srebrenica with the ones committed against Serbs in Sarajevo, said that 3,000 to 5,000 Serbs died. The Croatian-Muslim Federation authorities say these numbers are greatly exaggerated. In the past few years, the Human Rights Commission and the Constitutional Court passed decisions ordering the Federation authorities to investigate the case of missing Serbs and to compensate their families. Such decisions were similar to the one that led to the creation of the Srebrenica Commission [IJT-7]. Moreover, the Bosnia-Herzegovina parliament passed a resolution in January 2004 tasking the Council of Ministers with the creation of the Sarajevo commission. This was never done. Consequently, the Serb delegates boycotted the federal institutions in May and the Council of Ministers suddenly decided to create this commission. The commission composed of 3 Bosnians, 3 Croatians, 3 Serbs and 1 representative of other ethnicities was supposed to be up and running by June 8, but it was not. Once again, the Serbs boycotted the Parliament. "The B-H Council of Ministers was obliged to do its job. Republika Srpska MPs do not want to attend any sessions until the Council of Ministers explains why it did not set up the commission," said Nikola Spiric, Deputy Chairman of the House of Representatives, according to the Bosnian-Serb press agency SRNA.