Noticias

Bosnia's Federation entity has adopted a set of anti-corruption laws, which aim to establish specific law-enforcement bodies tasked with pursuing perpetrators of organised crime.

Lawmakers in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, one of Bosnia's two entities, on May 6 adopted changes to laws on dealing with corruption.

The changes to the Law on Courts and the Law on Criminal Procedure, Corruption and Organized Crime allow for the creation of special units tasked with pursuing and trying perpetrators of organized crime and corruption.

A Bosnian Serb party said the new chief of the country's Communications Regulatory Agency should be a Serb, but the minister responsible insisted that ethnicity should not be an issue.

A row erupted after the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats, SNSD, a party from Bosnia’s Serb-led entity, Republika Srpska, insisted that the next head of the agency that regulates the country’s broadcasting and telecommunications sectors and allocates frequencies should be a Serb.

The vice-president of the Serbian Progressive Party said that it would not forget the support it has received from Republika Srpska’s opposition Serb Democratic Party.

Nikola Selakovic, vice-president of Belgrade’s ruling Serbian Progressive Party, SNS, told a conference of the Serb Democratic Party, SDS, in Bijeljina on Sunday that it had his backing ahead of polls due in Bosnia and Herzegovina in October this year.

The two main Bosniak and Croat parties in Mostar said they would work together on economic issues in the city, putting aside their political disputes over the voting system.

Two key parties in Mostar, the Bosniak Party of Democratic Action, SDA, and the Croatian Democratic Union, HDZ, discussed development of the troubled Herzegovinian city, adding that they had come up with a strategic document to aid the economic situation.

In a meeting on April 8, the two parties discussed the functioning of the city and cantonal authorities and revealed some of their plans. 

Sarajevo City Council has cancelled its earlier decision to award honorary citizenship to Milan Bandic, the Mayor of Zagreb, after he said Bosnia should have three entities, not two.

The City Council of Sarajevo has withdrawn its decision, made in February, to make Zagreb Mayor Milan Bandic an honorary citizen of the Bosnian capital owing to his recent statements backing a third, Croatian entity for Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Deputy Sarajevo Mayor Aljosa Campara said he hoped the decision would not harm relations between Sarajevo and Zagreb.

Three government officials have resigned or been sacked over the last two weeks after the opposition spotlighted their criminal records.

The logistics director in the port of Durres, Fisnik Myrtezaj, a recent appointment by the centre-left government of Edi Rama, resigned on Monday following accusations that he had a criminal record for drug trafficking.  

On Sunday, the opposition Democratic Party said Myrtezaj had been jailed in 2011 for three and half years for the crime.

Three opposition parties in Republika Srpska are forming a broad coalition aaimed at challenging the ruling Alliance of Independent Social Democrats led by the entity president, Milorad Dodik.

Three opposition parties in Republika Srpska, one of two entities in Bosnia, on March 19 said they were uniting into one bloc - and would talk to other interested parties prior to the elections.

Bosnia's State Prosecutor has denied claims made by a judge that it eavesdrops and works to an agenda set by the country's Bosniak political parties.

Bosnia's Prosecutor's Office has denied eavesdropping and rebuffed claims that it works unde the influence of the country's main Bosniak parties.

“It is sad that some judicial officials, even judges... join in media attacks on institutions,” the Prosecutor said on Wednesday. 

Amid talk of a third, Croat entity in Bosnia, a Bosnian Croat leader has said that another solution would be reorganising the current Federation entity, with its 10 cantons, into three larger units.

Dragan Covic, head of the Croatian Democratic Union, HDZ, the largest Croat party in Bosnia, said that the Federation entity should be reorganised into three units, which he said would strengthen Bosnia and Herzegovina and prevent its disintegration.