REPUBLIKA SRPSKA PRIME MINISTER RESIGNS

BANJA LUKA, March 5 (Hina) - The Prime Minister of the Bosnian Serb entity of Republika Srpska, Milorad Dodik, submitted his resignation at an extraordinary session in Banja Luka on Friday. He said he tendered his resignation as a result of a decision reached by the arbitration commission for Brcko earlier in the day. Since January 18, 1998, when I became Prime Minister, I clearly stated to the international community that "the only way to fully implement the Dayton Agreement is for the decision of the international arbitration tribunal to be that Brcko remains within Republika Srpska," Dodik told the Bosnian Serb television. He called for a session of the Republika Srpska Assembly to discuss the present political situation. Brcko is a town in the north of the country. Its residents before the war comprised mostly of Moslems and Croats. During the Homeland War in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bosnian Serbs occupied the town to create a corridor between their territory and FR Yugoslavia. The Dayton Agreement envisaged that the status of Brcko be determined by an arbitration commission because the two entities could not reach an agreement as to which entity this town should belong. (hina) lml