The Bosniak-civic bloc that is part of Bosnia and Herzegovina's ruling coalition insists on comprehensive changes to BiH's election law, but there is still no agreement on the changes, Foreign Minister Elmedin Konakovic said on Wednesday, noting also that the country's Constitution should be changed as well.

Konakovic, who leads the People and Justice (NiP) party, which is a member of BiH's ruling coalition, told reporters in Sarajevo that the draft changes to the election law presented last week by HDZ BiH party leader Dragan Covic had not been agreed with the Bosniak and civic parties in the ruling coalition.

“We don't have a harmonised proposal,” he said.

Technical changes to BiH's election law in the part concerning the oversight of the voting process and ballot counting is one of the conditions for Bosnia and Herzegovina to get the approval of the European Council in March to start talks on accession to the EU, but Covic insists that changes pertaining to the way the Croat member of the collective BiH Presidency is elected should be implemented as well.

The proposal presented by the HDZ BiH leader stipulates that votes in those cantons in the Bosniak-Croat shared Federation entity, where Croats make up a relative or absolute majority, would be crucial for the election of the Croat member of the tripartite BiH Presidency.

The US Embassy in Bosnia and Herzegovina responded to the proposal, warning that it does not address judgements of the European Court of Human Rights that have determined discrimination against BiH citizens in the election process based on their ethnicity or place of residence.

Covic said he believes that there is currently no two-thirds majority in the BiH Parliament necessary to amend the Constitution and implement the ECHR judgements so he proposed changes to the Election Law that require a majority vote in the House of Representatives, to resolve the issue of the election of the Croat member of the BiH Presidency.

Konakovic said that parties of the Bosniak-civic bloc still believe that it is possible to amend the Constitution, and announced for next week a meeting with representatives of all parliamentary parties to agree a comprehensive solution with the aim of implementing the ECHR rulings, describing the new model of the election of the Croat member of the BiH Presidency “a part of that package.”

“There could be serious progress,” Konakovic said, adding that everyone was agreed that the way members of the Central Election Commission were elected should be changed to depoliticise that body, and that technical changes to the election law were imperative, as High Representative Christian Schmidt would impose them if local politicians failed to adopt them.

Plenkovic should have told Komšić everything to his face

Konakovic also described as inappropriate Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic's decision to avoid a meeting with members of the BiH Presidency during his visit to Sarajevo on Tuesday, but also criticised the Croat member of the BiH Presidency, Zeljko Komsic, for his treatment of the Croatian prime minister.

“It is inappropriate of Plenkovic not to meet members of a BiH institution just as it is inappropriate of Komsic to liken Plenkovic to Putin,” Konakovic told reporters.

Plenkovic on Tuesday recalled Komsic having likened his relationship to Bosnia and Herzegovina to Putin's relationship to Ukraine, accusing him of interfering in BiH's internal affairs.

The Croatian PM travelled to Sarajevo together with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte but he would not attend the meeting with BiH Presidency members because he did not want to meet with Komsic, whom Croatian officials refuse to meet, saying that he was not elected with the votes of the Bosnian Croats.

Konakovic said that by visiting Sarajevo, Plenkovic was showing how much he wanted to help Bosnia and Herzegovina, adding that it was Plenkovic who had proposed that von der Leyen and Rutte come with him so they could encourage local politicians to carry on with the reforms necessary for the EU to launch accession talks with BiH.

The BiH foreign minister said that Plenkovic was trying to help Bosnia and Herzegovina on its journey to the EU any way he could.

“I have been saying that in Brussels at every opportunity,” Konakovic said.

He added that he would have been happy if Plenkovic had visited the BiH Presidency on Tuesday and told “Komsic to his face what he thought of him.”

Konakovic believes that BiH can meet the criteria for the launching of accession talks until March but is cautious as to whether it will happen, stressing that nevertheless BiH will consistently follow the EU's foreign policy and not make any compromises in that regard.