Milorad Dodik

Just ahead of local elections due in Bosnia this Sunday, a poll shows that the country's main Bosniak [Muslim] party, the Party of Democratic Action, SDA, has retained its dominance in the country's largest entity, the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

BELGRADE - The head of Republika Srpska has rejected a summons by state prosecutors, saying he would not travel to Sarajevo for questioning after he defied a high-court ruling by holding a controversial referendum.

Republika Srpska's President Milorad Dodik was summoned after Bosnian Serbs on September 25 voted overwhelmingly to maintain a "statehood day" holiday on January 9.

Dodik said on Tuesday that he does not feel safe enough to go to Sarajevo to answer calls to attend a prosecution hearing after Republika Srpska held a controversial referendum in defiance of a ban by the state Constitutional Court.

RS President Milorad Dodik said on Tuesday afternoon that was yet to receive the Bosnian prosecution's announced summons for questioning.

Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic says Bakir Izetbegovic should explanation a statement he made comparing RS President Milorad Dodik to Muammar Gaddafi.

Nikolic said this for the Belgrade-based Vecernje Novosti newspaper on Tuesday, referring to Izetbegovic - a Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim) politician who currently chairs the tripartite Presidency of Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Dodik declared himself unafraid of arrest on Monday evening after Bosnia's state prosecution called him to appear at a hearing in connection with Sunday's banned referendum in the Serb-led entity.

The Republika Srpska leader told N1 TV that the state could not arrest the leader of a people.

Sunday's referendum in the RS "threatens to strengthen the confrontation between the international community and RS President Milorad Dodik."

Serb Republic (RS) President Milorad Dodik says he is "not afraid of getting arrested" because of the RS Day referendum, held in the Serb entity on Sunday.

SARAJEVO - Republika Srpska President Milorad Dodik has been summoned for questioning as a suspect over the holding of Sunday's Republika Srpska Day referendum, the Fena news agency reported Monday.

The Prosecutor's Office confirmed to Fena Dodik had been summoned to testify in a case of non-execution of a decision of the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Sinisa Karan, president of the referendum commission in Republika Srpska, told a press conference on Monday that, after all votes have been counted, 99.81 per cent of voters had said "yes" to maintaining January 9 as the mainly Serbian entity's national day.

Karan said that of the 1,219,399 people eligible to vote, 680,116 did so, giving a turnout of 55.67 per cent.