SARAJEVO-BELGRADE RELATIONS SARAJEVO, May 19 (Hina) - Serbian Premier Zoran Zivkovic has again stirred up polemics about possible changes to state borders on the Balkans, and thus inflicted damage to relations between Serbia and
Bosnia-Herzegovina which have been improving in recent months because of the need for co-operation in a clamp-down on organised crime, the Sarajevo media reported Monday.
SARAJEVO, May 19 (Hina) - Serbian Premier Zoran Zivkovic has again
stirred up polemics about possible changes to state borders on the
Balkans, and thus inflicted damage to relations between Serbia and
Bosnia-Herzegovina which have been improving in recent months
because of the need for co-operation in a clamp-down on organised
crime, the Sarajevo media reported Monday. #L#
Zivkovic said in an interview which the German Der Spiegel paper
released last week that the West must not mull over a possibility of
giving independence to Kosovo, as it would set off a chain reaction
in the entire region.
"Such a scenario would be a dangerous precedent. This would again
bring into question the borders in the entire Balkans, not only the
boundary-line of the Republic of Srpska within Bosnia-
Herzegovina," Zivkovic said.
He warned that the secession of Kosovo would cause the annexation of
the Bosnian Serb entity to "the motherland", a term he used
referring to Serbia.
The Sarajevo media gave a broad coverage to Zivkovic's statements,
and a significant number of Bosniak (Muslim) and Croat officials in
Bosnia gave negative comments on the Serbian premier's words.
(hina) ms sb