Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić said on August 1 that Serbia’s National Security Council will adopt conclusions regarding the Bosnian court’s ruling that upheld a prison sentence for Milorad Dodik, President of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s Republika Srpska (RS) entity.
The Council will meet on August 2 in Belgrade to discuss the verdict and other security issues, including the recent arrests related to the reconstruction of Novi Sad’s railway station where 16 people died in November 2024.
“Serbia has not faced a crisis this serious since 2008,” Vučić said during a visit to a village recently hit by wildfires in southern Serbia.
On August 1, the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina upheld Dodik’s one-year prison sentence and banned him from holding public office for six years for disobeying the High Representative’s decisions. Dodik’s lawyer said they will appeal to Bosnia’s Constitutional Court and possibly to the European Court of Human Rights, requesting to suspend the verdict’s enforcement in the meantime.
The EU Office in Bosnia stated the verdict is binding and must be respected, echoing the Office of the High Representative (OHR) which said court decisions must be followed.
Dodik has rejected the ruling, calling it illegitimate. He was convicted for signing decrees to enact laws that the High Representative had annulled. These laws aimed to block the implementation of Bosnia’s Constitutional Court and OHR decisions in Republika Srpska.
After the initial verdict in February, the RS Assembly adopted new laws limiting the power of Bosnia’s state-level courts and police, prompting the Bosnian court to issue a warrant for Dodik for alleged attacks on the constitutional order.
Despite the warrant, Dodik and other RS officials voluntarily appeared before the Bosnian Prosecutor’s Office in July, avoiding arrest but receiving restrictions instead.
