Constitutional Court Ruling Adds to Bosnia's Turmoil

The Bosnian Serb proposal to reform Bosnia's Constitutional Court caused a stir in the House of Representatives of parliament on Wednesday after the Constitutional Commission - in charge of examining the constitutionality of draft laws before they are submitted to the chamber - rejected it.

The House of Representatives, which then voted on whether to back or reject the opinion of the Commission, duly split along ethnic lines and voted against the decision of the Commission, which will now have to re-examine the proposal.

The Alliance of the Independent Social-Democrats, SNSD, and the Serbian Democratic Party, SDS, the parties that proposed the reform claimed the opinion of the Commission was politically motivated.

"We need to oppose the decision of the Commission," Dusanka Majkic, from the SNSD, told the session. "In the RS we will never accept it," she said.

Mladen Bosic, leader of the SDS and deputy president of the House of Representatives, said the Court had already "caused a deep political crisis with their decision on the Day of Republika Srpska" - which it outlawed as discriminatory.

"It is obvious that by this decision the Court has played a political role, which is not its job," he added.

Another SNSD deputy, Milica Markovic, said the Republika Srpska was now ready to organize a referendum on the Court's powers, adding ominously that this would be only the first step before "the most important referendum".

A senior Bosnian Serb official told BIRN that the RS president, Milorad Dodik, may advise RS representatives in the state parliament to refrain from taking part in its work until the Commission re-examines the draft and parliament has voted again.

The SNSD and SDS draft said the Court should in future...