On this day in 1943, the antifascist, liberation movement, ZAVNOBiH, held the first session and passed the decision to restore the country's statehood within its historic borders, which is marked today as the Statehood Day of Bosnia and Herzegovina. However, the Day is celebrated in only half of the country - its Bosnian-Croat shared Federation (FBiH) entity.
Bosnia restored its statehood as one of six Yugoslav republics after the liberation in 1945 and was assigned with its own flag and the coat of arms.
The historic decision was confirmed a few days later at the first session of the Anti-Fascist Council for the National Liberation of Yugoslavia (AVNOJ).
Bosnia and Herzegovina was defined as an integral and indivisible country where all peoples would be entitled to equal rights. The ZAVNOBiH's resolution was endorsed by 247 councillors, representing all peoples.
The resolution stipulated that the peoples living in Bosnia want their country, which is neither Serb nor Croat nor Muslim, but both Serb and Muslim as well as Croat, to be free and to ensure the full equality of all Serbs, Muslims and Croats.
After the signing of the Dayton agreement in 1995, which ended the war in the country, Bosnia did not get a law on national holidays, so its two entities continue to observe the days they had until 1995.
The Serb entity Republika Srpska (RS) insists that present-day Bosnia has no continuity with the pre-war Bosnia and that November 25, therefore, cannot be its Statehood Day. In doing so, however, it ignores the fact that the Dayton agreement defined present-day Bosnia as the legal successor to the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina and that its laws, including the one on national holidays, remain in force until changed.
Activities marking this important date in the country's rich history began Wednesday morning with the raising of the largest Bosnian flag at the Hum hill near Sarajevo.
