"The agreement was contrary to the interests of Croats as well of Bosniaks (Bosnian Muslims). I would definitely not sign it now either, " Kresimir Zubak told the Herceg-Bosna local radio station.
In 1995, when the Dayton peace accords were reached, Zubak was the president of the Croat-Muslim federation in Bosnia and a senior official of Bosnia's Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ BiH).
Zubak on Monday told the radio that the Dayton peace accords "violated the Constitution of the Bosnian federation", drafted by Croats and Bosniaks after the conclusion of the Washington peace agreement, which stoped their conflict and lay the foundation for the establishment of the Croat-Bosniak entity, called the Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina.
The NHI leader said today that the main reason for his refusal to sign the 1995 Washington agreement was the fact that northern areas, predominantly populated by Croats and Bosniaks before the war, would remain, under the agreement, under Serb control.
In addition, it was unacceptable for him to see the country with three constituent peoples being organised into two entities.
"This is not a solution which would make it possible for Bosnia-Herzegovina to be a viable state," Zubak said.
On 21 November 1995, the peace agreement was signed in Wright Peterson Base in the US city of Dayton, which stopped the war which had ravaged Bosnia for nearly four years.
After Zubak refused to sign the document, Jadranko Prlic, who is now an indictee of the UN war crimes tribunal, put his signature on behalf of the Bosnian Croat people. The Dayton agreement was initialled in Paris at the start of 1996, by the then presidents of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia and Serbia, Alija Izetbegovic, Franjo Tudjman and Slobodan Milosevic respectively.
The ninth anniversary of the conclusion of the Dayton peace accords was marked in Bosnia quietly. The country's three-man presidency on Monday held a reception for foreign diplomats.
There is an increasing number of proposals that the Dayton agreement be amended so as to make Bosnia a more efficient state.