Austrian Ambassador Martin Pammer was, according to the latest letter Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik sent to the diplomat, “only an unnecessary obstacle” to good relations between Austria and Republika Srpska (RS), Bosnia’s Serb-dominated part.
The letter is the latest in a back-and-forth between the Bosnian Serb leader and the diplomat, which began when Dodik refused to meet with Pammer.
Dodik, who will be swapping his post of President of the Serb-dominated semi-autonomous entity in Bosnia, Republika Srpska (RS), for the post of the Bosnian Serb member of the tripartite state presidency, declined Pammer’s invitation for a meeting in early November. In a letter to Pammer, which was published on Wednesday, he accused him of anti-Serb bias during his mandate.
“With your biased statements, you have very frequently been outside the framework of good diplomatic behaviour and with that, you alienated us from cooperation with a country which we highly respect and with which we would like to cooperate,” the RS President wrote.
Pammer responded the same day when Dodik’s initial letter began circulating in local media.
“Unfortunately, I have to point out that the respect, which you have in your letter expressed several times toward Austria and its state bodies, does not show in practice,” Pammer wrote, adding that the Bosnian Serb leader never attended events organised by the Austrian Embassy.
“I firmly reject your assertion that ‘favoured Bosniak politics’ and I have to correct it, as I have always represented the official position of the Austrian Government,” he wrote.
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Dodik’s response came on Thursday.
“The letter that you have sent me through the media yesterday only confirms that I had reason enough not to meet with you,” his letter began.
He wrote that the fact that Pammer released his letter to media without sending it directly first shows that he “does not know what good diplomatic practice entails.”
“In your letter, you do not approach me as a diplomat, but as an actor within Bosnia’s internal political scene, using nearly the same language that my political enemies use,” Dodik alleged.
Pammer on Wednesday wrote that Dodik’s rhetoric and his questioning of the integrity of Bosnia and Herzegovina had resulted in uncertainty and fear among Austrian investors.
Austrian investors are welcome in Republika Srpska, Dodik countered.
“But whether you are responsible for the refusal of some investors to come could also be discussed,” he wrote.
He countered the allegation that he did not attend events organised by the Austrian Embassy by implying that Pammer also never visited ceremonies organised for the ‘Day of Republika Srpska’, a holiday marking the creation of the RS which the Constitutional Court ruled was unconstitutional.
Dodik also touched upon a statement Pammer allegedly posted on social media regarding “political elites” not visiting the Austrian Embassy, but rather visiting embassies of Turkey and Saudi Arabia.
“Have you not, with that, admitted that your mandate in Sarajevo is a complete failure and a missed chance for Austria and its influence?,” Dodik wrote.
