The Republika Srpska (RS) has never contested the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) in accordance with the Dayton Agreement and secession has never been our policy, said Milorad Dodik, president of the RS, one of the two BiH entities, a day after he visited BiH CIA director William Burns.
On August 20, Burns visited the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sarajevo, due to, among other things, the worrisome secessionist rhetoric and actions of Dodik and the Government of the RS, as an official of the Government of the United States of America (USA) told Radio Free Europe (RSE) that he requested not be named.
During the visit, the director of the American Central Intelligence Agency met with the director of the Intelligence and Security Agency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Almir Džuv, the head of state diplomacy, Elmedin Konaković, as well as with the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
As confirmed by several sources for RSE, Željka Cvijanović, a member of the Presidency from RS, who is on the sanctions list of the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) of the US Department of Finance, was also present at the meeting.
Dodik, who is himself on the list of sanctions, said in a post on the X network that "the fight against terrorism is the duty of the entire free world, and in this context the visit of CIA director Mr. William Burns to Bosnia and Herzegovina is significant."
"Republika Srpska is dedicated to this fight and welcomes any cooperation in this area," said Dodik.
He pointed out that the RS does not pursue a policy of secession, but that "it has the right to a political struggle for its status, in accordance with the letter of the Dayton Agreement".
"BiH is a union of two equal entities and three constitutive peoples, therefore Mr. Burns' position that the responsibility for the functioning of the country lies with all ethnic communities is encouraging," said Dodik.
In March of this year, the intelligence community in the USA in its annual report on threats around the world, in the part concerning BiH, apostrophized the name of Milorad Dodik.
"[Dodik] is taking provocative steps to neutralize international monitoring in Bosnia and Herzegovina and ensure de facto secession for the Republika Srpska," this document states.
Burns, a former diplomat and former ambassador to Russia, is one of the central figures in the administration of US President Joe Biden, and is also part of his cabinet.
He was appointed to the position of director of the CIA in January 2021, and after taking the oath in March of that year, he became the first career diplomat to head American intelligence.
The US intelligence chief last visited Bosnia and Herzegovina in 2016, when the then director of the CIA, John Brennan, was in Sarajevo.
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