Compliments to BiH from Brussels? Just a few months ago this headline would seem impossible in the local media. However, on September 30, 2009, Head of the European Commission Delegation to Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ambassador Dimitris Kourkoulas, said:

“I would like to congratulate the authorities involved in adoption and implementation of legislative measures... These developments are encouraging and will be assessed by the European Commission as soon as all other important missing elements of the Road Map, including the biometric passports, are fulfilled.”

It seems that Bosnia and Herzegovina is capable of doing something good after all. This time, we really do deserve the compliments, and what we did, we did on our own, without anyone`s help. Adoption of the anticorruption measures, prevention of money laundering, financing of terrorist activities, the agreement on the exchange of information from police and prosecutorial records – these are only some of the accomplished agreements.

And only a few months ago, everything looked different

I recently returned home to London after two years working in Bosnia, and was surprised to be contacted by several friends who asked whether another war was about to break out in Bosnia. My work took me to places such as Srebrenica, Foca and Gorazde, the scene of wartime horrors. But in all of them I saw people try to move forward with their lives, despite the turmoil of the past...

 

Karadzic has been arrested! – echoed the news in all world media on Monday evening, July 21st 2008. Instant-broadcast of Zlatko Lagumdzija, war-time vice president of the Bosnian government and actual president of the SDP (Social Democratic Party of BiH) live in CNN programme transfers a part of the atmosphere from Sarajevo to the world: "the citizens of Sarajevo on the streets of city. Celebration, flags, car sirens. Atmosphere just like after some big sport's event!"

But in reality, just a few dozens of people on the streets of the capital...

The phrase "Catch-22" is a common idiomatic expression meaning "a no-win situation" or "a double bind" of any type; self-contradictory circular logic that prevents escape from insupportable circumstances.

Some days ago, Richard Holbrooke arrived in Bosnia. He was away for a while. For those who don`t know, Mr. Holbrooke was one of the creators of the Dayton Peace Agreement. He is concerned about B&H. Now he believes it was a mistake to structure the DPA in the way in which it was done. He also expressed his dissatisfaction with the views of the future that the RS government is articulating. In May 1998, he was quoted as praising the new Bosnian Serb government for looking to the future rather than to the past.