Bosnia Presidency Chairman Milorad Dodik said his upcoming meeting with Pope Francis will be a meeting between two state presidents where global developments will be discussed and not issues which some Bosniak associations have recently raised.
The visit announced for April 26 triggered reactions among associations of war victims in Bosnia, whose representatives warned the Catholic Church leader he would meet someone who glorifies war criminals.
RELATED NEWS
After the visit was announced, the associations told Apostolic Nuncio in Bosnia to inform the pontiff that Dodik was someone who denies genocide and glorifies the perpetrators.
Milorad Dodik is Bosnian Serb leader who often expresses solidarity with the Serbs who were convicted by international and Bosnian courts of war crimes committed during the 1992-95 Bosnian war. Also, he denies that what happened in the eastern Bosnian town of Srebrenica was an act of genocide, although two international courts confirmed that.
But the Presidency Chairman said he would not be speaking to the Pope about what some Bosniak associations demanded.
“I will be in the Vatican on April 26th at the Pope’s invitation and we will hold talks there in a form of two state presidents’ meeting, since the Vatican, as a state, has certain influence at the global level regarding the policies conducted in the world,” said the Presidency Chairman pointing out it would be interesting to him to discuss those issues with the Holy Father.
“I expect to have a talk on developments, processes in the world which prove that polarisation and conflicts that tend to be global mostly happen on a religious basis,” he added.
