Bosnia’s top court upholds political ban on Bosnian Serb leader Dodik

Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik’s appeal against a ruling preventing him from politics was rejected by the top court in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Dodik’s final legal recourse before the nation’s judiciary came on Tuesday, just days after a Sarajevo court found him guilty of refusing to follow the orders of the international envoy over the peace deal.

Recommended Stories

list of 3 itemsend of list

Dodik, the former head of Bosnia’s autonomous Serb Republic or Republika Srpska, was given a year in prison in February for defaming Christian Schmidt, the German diplomat responsible for preserving the 1995 peace agreements that put an end to Bosnia’s conflict in the 1990s.

Additionally, he received a six-year suspension for his position as president and a political office ban.

Dodik, a pro-Russian nationalist who has pushed for Serbian independence, had rejected the ruling and vowed to contest it politically.

The international envoy’s decision-making authority, which Dodik introduced in the Republika Srpska parliament in July 2023, was overturned.

In response, Schmidt used his executive powers to amend Bosnia’s criminal code, creating a new offense for breaking his own laws, the crime that led to Dodik’s conviction.

Dodik’s attorneys argued in their appeal to the Constitutional Court that Schmidt had no authority to change the criminal code, arguing that only the country’s parliament was able to do so.

However, the top court ruled on Tuesday that Dodik’s assertions that Schmidt had no authority and status were “unfounded.”

In a statement, the appellant claimed that the appellant’s right to a fair trial was not violated in the criminal proceedings against him.

Dodik’s attorneys have already made it clear that they will file the case with the European Court of Human Rights.

Dodik and his legal team did not respond to the decision made on Tuesday.