Croatian Republic of Herzeg-Bosnia

Jadranko Prlic, the former prime minister of the unrecognised wartime Herzeg-Bosna Croatian Community, is the first of the six Bosnian Croat ex-officials to launch an appeal on Monday against war crimes convictions at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, ICTY in The Hague.

Appeals hearings will be held this month in the case of six former six Bosnian Croat leaders convicted by the Hague Tribunal of committing war crimes in the short-lived unrecognised statelet of Herzeg-Bosna.

The new chairman of the Bosnia-Herzegovina Presidency, Mladen Ivanic, said Friday it would be good to organize a trilateral meeting.

It would bring together the presidents and prime minister of Serbia, Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina, with the goal of "easing" political relations, Tanjug has reported.

Aleksandar Vucic said on Tuesday that the Serb-Bosniak relations are the backbone for the survival of the Western Balkans "in the proper sense of the word."

The Serbian prime minister, speaking in Mostar, Bosnia-Herzegovina, where he is on a one-day visit, also called for resolving all problems peacefully.

Almost two decades after the war in Bosnia ended, positive momentum seems lost, the country shows signs of backsliding and stronger international engagement is needed, a report entitled "Bosnia and Herzegovina - New International Thinking", which leading British academic institutions will publish this week, says.

Croatian President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic sought to calm concerns about her views on Bosnia on her first official visit abroad, to Sarajevo on Tuesday.  

After meeting Bosnia's Presidency, members of parliament and the government she sought to cool tensions related to the position of Croats in Bosnia.

Bosnia's new US ambassador, Maureen Cormick, arrived in Sarajevo on Tuesday amidst a brewing political, economic and social crisis that has bedevilled a new international approach to the troubled country.

RS leader supports "third, Croat entity" in Bosnia

ZAGREB -- Serb Republic (Republika Srpska, RS) President Milorad Dodik has said that Bosnia-Herzegovina "has no future except as a loose confederation."

Dodik also spoke in favor of the creation of a third, Croat entity in that country, noting that "Herzeg-Bosnia used to exist."

Kukic told BIRN on Tuesday that he was attacked because he spoke out against the welcome party thrown for returning convict Dario Kordic in his hometown of Busovaca, which was attended by representatives of the Croatian Democratic Union, the party that governs the Mostar area.

The head of the Croatian Democratic Union, HDZ, Tomislav Karamarko, and the head of its Bosnian sister party, HDZ BiH, Dragan Covic, said Croats needed to gain real equality if the country was to make progress.