The fact that Bosnian political party leaders met for the first time in 10 years to discuss the amendment of the Constitution is a success, said US Institute for Peace president Donald Hays, who headed a task force which for the past seven months has been been drafting constitutional changes in Bosnia.
He added they were agreed in principle that the state would be competent for leading negotiations on a Stabilisation and Association Agreement (SAA) with the European Union.
However, participants remained divided over other issues, so the talks are expected to continue in Washington on the tenth anniversary of the Dayton peace agreement, which ended the war in Bosnia in 1995.
The president of the Muslim Party of Democratic Action (SDA), Sulejman Tihic, said the party leaders were close to an agreement on the state's jurisdiction in negotiations on Euro-Atlantic integration, but that there remained the problem of the structure, jurisdiction and functioning of the state parliament and presidency.
"I expect these agreements to provide a good basis for the continuation of talks and a final agreement in Washington," he said.
The president of Bosnia's Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ BH), Dragan Covic, said no agreement had been reached on some significant details, but that progress had been made regarding human rights. "Everything envisaged by the European Convention on Human Rights is absolutely acceptable."
Mladen Ivanic of the Serb Party of Democratic Progress (PDP) said a significant result had been achieved which should provide Bosnian institutions with powers to negotiate and guarantee the implementation of what had been agreed in the SAA negotiations.
The meeting in Brussels began on Saturday, organised by the Institute for Peace and the European Commission. Participants were presented a summary of draft constitutional changes drawn up by a task force of US experts.
Bosnian Social Democratic Party president Zlatko Lagumdzija said he thought the prospects of an agreement before the Brussels meeting were 1:3 but that now they were 1:2.