Milorad Dodik

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (C) and Bosnia presidency member Milorad Dodik (L) meeting in Sarajevo, July 8, 2019. Photo: EPA-EFE/FEHIM DEMIR

The Bosnian Serb leader earlier threatened to withdraw all Bosnian Serb officials from state-level institutions and re-establish a Bosnian Serb army, fomenting fresh fears of Bosnia's collapse and of armed conflict.

Orban led a high-level Hungarian delegation that visited to Dodik's hometown Laktasi in Bosnia's Serb-dominated Republika Srpska entity on Saturday. He said he intended to return a favour after Dodik's visit to Orban on September 24, yet details of the Bosnian visit remain sketchy.

Ljubljana – Prime Minister Janez Janša met on Sunday Milorad Dodik, the Serbian member of the Bosnia-Herzegovina presidency, to discuss the political situation in Bosnia-Herzegovina and the region. Janša described the meeting on Twitter as a substantive exchange about the situation in the country.

Bosnian Presidency member Milorad Dodik (R) shakes hand with Austrian Foreign Minister Michael Linhart (L) as he arrives for a meeting at the Bosnian Presidency, 15 October 2021. Photo: EPA-EFE/FEHIM DEMIR

Bosnia and Herzegovina faces possible break-up and renewed conflict if Bosnian Serb political leader Milorad Dodik finally goes ahead with his separatist agenda-but is he serious about seceding, or just seeking to consolidate political power?

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, and Bosnian presidency members Sefik Dzeferovic, Zeljko Komsic and Milorad Dodik in Belgrade, October 2019. Photo: EPA-EFE/ANDREJ CUKIC.

The NGOs' joint letter also criticised the inaction of the international community and recalled the consequences of the 1990s war in Bosnia.

The RS is almost wholly economically dependent on Sarajevo, and on increasingly frequent financial transfusions from Belgrade.

Dodik blaming foreign powers for the tensions in Bosnia, accused them of wanting to create "a Muslim state" and warned that any move by the European Union to exclude the Republika Srpska from its initiatives in the country would only "cement the independence" of the entity.

Vucic took to the stage, adjusted his suit, and read the room. In the front row were some familiar faces: Former US Vice President Mike Pence, the prime ministers of Slovenia and Czechia, Janez Jansa and Andrej Babis, Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik and the man they had all come to see, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

According to Dodik, this could include pulling Bosnian Serb soldiers out of Bosnia's joint armed forces and re-establishing Republika Srpska's own military, as well as withdrawing from the country's indirect taxation system.