The Balkans Are Coming Apart at the Seams Again
The world can’t afford to ignore the region’s complex hatreds. If it does, history may repeat itself.
Milorad Dodik, president of the Republika Srpska enclave of Bosnia-Herzegovina, at his final campaign rally in Banja Luka on Oct. 5.
Photographer: Darko Vojinovic/AP Photo
When a country elects a president, the choice is not usually someone whose stated aim is to break it apart. But that’s just happened—ominously—in a country synonymous with 20th century European conflict.
Milorad Dodik, who is emerging as the most powerful politician in Bosnia-Herzegovina after a vote this month, has made a career of advocating partition. He’s the leader of the Serb minority in that hyphenated country stitched together after the Balkan wars of the 1990s; and he’s always been clear about what he wants—to carve it up again and create an independent entity allied to Serbia next door. “This is not a common state, we are all its prisoners,” he said in 2016. “Bosnia isn’t worth a dime.”