Political party leaders from BiH met in Brussels yesterday, along with European officials, in order to discuss possible solutions to the long-standing issues of implementing the European Court of Human Rights’ Sejdic-Finci decision and establishing a coordination mechanism for EU-accession issues.
The meeting resulted in an agreement on principles for resolving these issues. According to a press release from the office of European Commissioner Štefan Füle, the points agreed upon include:
- Full acceptance of the necessity to implement the judgment urgently by providing every BiH citizen with the right to stand for election to the BiH Presidency and House of Peoples.
- The Presidency of BiH shall consist of three directly elected members;
- Two members will be directly elected from the territory of the Federation (FBiH) according to the model to be agreed, and one shall be directly elected from the territory of the Republika Srpska (RS). The FBiH and RS are each one constituency.
- A citizen of BiH who is recorded to vote for the Brčko District shall have the right to vote for the member of BiH Presidency either in RS or in FBiH, in line with the applicable legislation.
- Agree, by 10 October, on electoral modalities that will meet the legitimate concerns of the Constituent Peoples and “Others”, while meeting international standards. The method of election of the two Presidency Members from FBiH through amendments of the Constitution and Election Law, should, in addition to the Strasbourg Court ruling, prevent imposing the outcome of election results on any Constituent Peoples or “Others”.
- The parties agree to finalise modalities for the establishment of an effective and efficient coordination mechanism on EU matters by respecting the principles of inclusion based on competencies, enshrined in the constitutions in BiH, which will be presented on 10 October.
- The 3rd session of the High Level Dialogue on the Accession Process shall be resumed on 10 October in Brussels under the chairmanship of the Commissioner Štefan Füle.
Commissioner Füle said after the meeting: “we had a good discussion and a lot of work has been done. We decided to put on hold this third session of HLDAP and resume it on the 10th October.
