Top 7 military conflicts today. War in the Balkans: Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina

After the First World War, Serbia as one of the victorious countries united the Balkan peoples into the kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenians. 1929 changed the name to a more neutral - Yugoslavia. The de facto dominant position was occupied by Serbs, although the idea of ​​uniting the southern Slavs into one state (hence the name) was declared. But the population of Yugoslavia was already too colorful.

The Serbs themselves - Orthodox Christians, Slovenes and Croats - Catholics, and Bosniks (South Slavic people who live mainly in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in the border between Serbia and Montenegro) - Muslims. Such a national team of Salt lived relatively peacefully in the conditions of dictatorship (during 1945-1980, Joseph Broz Tito was led by the Iron Hand country).

However, with the weakening of the socialist bloc and the fall of authoritarian regimes in Eastern Europe, the authorities also weakened in Yugoslavia (the country itself during the Cold War lavish between the two hostile blocks). This led to the effect of a kettle that boiled with a steam lid. The contradictions between the colorful population of the state that have accumulated for decades have spilled into bloody ethnic cleanses in different regions of the disintegration.

When in 1991 the Yugoslav Republics began to proclaim sovereignty, it turned out that some of them live compactly Serbs, who became separatists in the separatist republics. The same fate befell the Serbs who lived in Bosnia and Herzegovina. After the newly formed state recognized the whole world, the Serbs actually began a civil war against Muslims and Catholics who inhabited the country.

The war lasted for three years and was accompanied by brutal ethnic cleanses of the apogee of which became a massacre in Srebrenica, which occurred in July 1995. At that time, the Serbian armed forces killed almost 8,000 male Muslim Buslets. In the fall of 1995, the United States invited the parties to negotiate for about a month on a closed military base in Deiton. Then a joke was spreading among the journalists that politicians were not released from the base until they agree.

In this way, the Dyton Agreements were published, which was equally divided between the three ethno-religious groups-Orthodox Serbs, Muslim Bosniaki and Catholics, which are mostly Croats. At the same time, Bosniaki and Croats were united in one administrative unit, which occupies 51% of the territory of the state. Accordingly, Serbian autonomy covered 49% of the country's area. That is, although the members of the Presidium are three, autonomous administrative entities - only two.

Both of them are endowed with their vertical power. The Catholic-Muslim territory delegated two representatives to the highest executive body-the Presidium (which replaces the President), and the Serbian country-one. That is, in the state instead of the president, a three -year -old head was formed. And they had a special representative of the UN, who practically concentrated political power in his hands. Interestingly, the Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina was annexed to the Dyton Agreements.

The next quarter of a century of existence of this state has shown the inefficiency of such a system of state power. The Presidium demonstrated extremely low functionality. In fact, each autonomy was guided separately. This only removed the country from the Catholic-Muslim conglomerate. In 2021, Russia blocked the appointment of another UN representative, which with a new force lit a conflict. Bosnian Serbs all autumn showed muscles, conducting military exercises.

Belgrade is ready to help the "brothers". Now the leader of Bosnian Serbs Milorad Dodik is returning to the rhetoric of threats on the eve of parliamentary elections in the country, which should take place on October 2. It is likely that the next wave of exacerbation of the situation can be expected. In many ways, the fate of the region depends on the results of the war in Ukraine.