INT. COMMUNITY URGES SERB ENTITY TO BE LOYAL TO BOSNIA

MOSTAR/BANJA LUKA, July 26 (Hina) - The first deputy of the international community's High Representative to Bosnia- Herzegovina on Friday called on officials of the Bosnian Serb entity to be loyal to Bosnia's state institutions. #L# State institutions can open new markets, enhance trade and export and stimulate investments. They can cope with inter-entity and international crime and launch a clamp-down on corruption and fraud, said Donald Hays, addressing a session of the Serb entity's parliament in Banja Luka. Hays urged MPs not to obstruct state institutions and to work on the adoption of laws which would be to the benefit of Bosnia's residents. The American diplomat insisted on changing the mindset which saw every attempt to build Bosnia as a nation as a bid to undermine the Bosnian Serb entity - the Republic of Srpska. This is a myth which stems from suspicion and has roots in ulterior motives. There are simply some things which must be done at the level of the Bosnian state if you wish to stimulate trade and international cooperation, Hays told the Serb parliamentarians. He stressed that he was speaking on behalf of High Representative Paddy Ashdown, and that was conveying the stance of the international community and the European Union, which appointed Ashdown to this post. Hays's appeal ensued after the Presidents of Croatia and Yugoslavia, Stjepan Mesic and Vojislav Kostunica respectively, and Bosnia's three-man Presidency last week signed a joint declaration on the inviolability of Bosnia's internationally recognised state borders as a guarantee for stability in south-east Europe. Under the 1995 Dayton peace accords which stopped the war in Bosnia, the country is divided into the two entities: Republic of Srpska and the Croat-Muslim entity (the Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina).