The parliament of the Republika Srpska entity in Bosnia and Herzegovina on Thursday abolished a state of emergency declared in that part of the country almost two months ago in an attempt to prevent the spread of the coronavirus epidemic.

The decision means that the curfew which has been in force every night and weekends since March 28 is no longer in force.

During the emergency situation, the entity was governed by RS president Zeljka Cvijanovic, who had the power to adopt regulations with legislative power while parliament was suspended.

Cvijanovic told the entity parliament on Thursday that declaring a state of emergency was necessary in an effort to promptly respond to the crisis while the opposition objected saying it had just slowed down government decisions which needed to be more resolute.

Cvijanovic and her party leader Milorad Dodik, insisted on introducing the most stringent restrictive measures in the entire entity including quarantine for all returnees from abroad, however, the number of people infected with the virus in the entity was constantly higher than the number in the Federation entity. Banja Luka was the greatest hotspot of the disease and a quarter of the 2,300 people infected overall were from that town and its vicinity.

The Federation entity did not declare a state of emergency but it declared a state of natural disaster and its parliament continued to function the entire time. That same situation was valid for the entire country for the duration of the epidemic.