In Bosnia, Elections Test Country's Lingering Fault Lines
Umer Jamshaid Published October 05, 2018 | 12:46 PM
As Bosnia heads towards elections Sunday, candidates are ramping up nationalist rhetoric, testing the seams of a country still struggling to unite a quarter-century after it was torn apart by war
Sarajevo, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 5th Oct, 2018 ) :As Bosnia heads towards elections Sunday, candidates are ramping up nationalist rhetoric, testing the seams of a country still struggling to unite a quarter-century after it was torn apart by war.
The Balkan state is stitched together by a tenuous power-sharing arrangement between groups that clashed during the 1992-1995 conflict: Serbs, Croats and Bosnian Muslims, also known as Bosniaks.
Sunday's poll will put the country's complex political system on full display, with voters casting ballots for a dizzying array of leaders and legislatures to fill out Bosnia's numerous layers of government.
The main race will be a run for the three-headed presidency, which rotates every eight months between a Serb, Croat and Bosnian Muslim leader.
But in a sign of the nationalism threatening the country's fragile status, the front-runner for the Serb presidency seat, Milorad Dodik, is a man who regularly calls post-war Bosnia a "failed concept".
Just this week, the US-sanctioned candidate told a crowd in Zvornik, which lies on the border with Serbia: "When you talk about (Bosnia), don't talk about a state, talk about a territory."Dodik, a pro-Russian nationalist in the running for the central presidency, has led Bosnia's Serb sub-region since 2006 and has periodically called for a referendum on its independence.
His rival for the Serb presidential seat, incumbent Mladen Ivanic, is warning voters that Dodik is leading Serbs towards "uncertainty, risk, conflict, and isolation".
Related Topics
Recent Stories
Senate continues discussion on Presidential address to Joint Sitting of Parliame ..
Masood Khan calls for Pak-US cooperation for regional peace
Interior Minister starts Margalla Trail Patrol for security
Currency Rate In Pakistan - Dollar, Euro, Pound, Riyal Rates On 26 April 2024
Today Gold Rate in Pakistan 26 April 2024
ICC Womens T20 World Cup Qualifier, Match 2: Ireland Women open with Comfortable ..
Robinson, bowlers help New Zealand go 2-1 up against Pakistan
Shahzeb Chachar to hold khuli kachehri on April 26
Heatwave amid Israel's aggression in Gaza brings new misery, disease risk
Tourism must change, mayor says as Venice launches entry fee
Court adjourns Judicial Complex attack case till May 17
Nasreen Noori’s book ‘Popatan Jahra Khwab’ launched
More Stories From World
-
Singapore expects 1-3 pct growth this year
8 minutes ago -
Hong Kong's Hang Seng Tech Index rises over 5 pct
8 minutes ago -
New Zealand business sector R&D expenditure hits 2.21 bln USD
8 minutes ago -
3 dead after mini car falls into west Japan paddy field
8 minutes ago -
Chinese shares higher at midday Friday
9 minutes ago -
Myanmar plans to export 2,000 tons of coffee in 2024-25 fiscal year
19 minutes ago
-
Chinese shares close higher Friday
19 minutes ago -
Pro-Palestinian US campus protests grow as police crack down
39 minutes ago -
Miner Anglo American rejects BHP's $38.8 bn takeover bid
49 minutes ago -
Guatemala prosecutors raid international NGO over alleged child abuse
59 minutes ago -
Another State Dept official resigns over US' Gaza policy amid growing student protests
59 minutes ago -
Togo leader Gnassingbe follows father's political playbook
1 hour ago