“Međunarodna zajednica ima brojne interese, a to utječe na vanjsku politiku Bosne i Hercegovine. Sa aspekta vanjske politike smatram da će Vlada Bosne i Hercegovine vjerovatno dobiti zadatak da rješava niz problema koji se nalaze na samom vrhu međunarodnih prioriteta.

Naprimjer, odlazak stranih ratnika na ratišta u Siriji i Iraku je zasigurno prioritetno pitanje ovdje u Washingtonu i očekujem da će se od Vlade Bosne i Hercegovine tražiti da poduzme konkretne korake kako bi spriječila odlazak ratnika u ove zemlje. Obamina administracija je u septembru čvrsto insistirala na usvajanju rezolucije u Vijeću sigurnosti koja je nametnula brojne obaveze zemljama po tom pitanju. Bosna i Hercegovina se također priključila i sprovela niz aktivnosti prikazujući time sebe kao pouzdanog i ozbiljnog aktera u ovim naporima. Ovo nije problem koji se odnosi samo na Bosnu i Hercegovinu, taj problem vidimo širom Zapadne Evrope, vidimo ga u mojoj zemlji Kanadi. Sve vlade rješavaju ova pitanja i očekujem da će se i od Bosne i Hercegovine tražiti da rješava ovaj problem.

Drugi element koji će po mom mišljenju utjecati na vanjsku politiku odnosi se na euroatlantske integracije. Smatram da bi ovo trebalo da bude jedan od prioriteta u okviru programa vanjske politike Vlade Bosne i Hercegovine. Trenutno vidimo signale iz Brisela da države članice nisu voljne da nastave process proširenja Unije. Zemljama Zapadnog Balkana je na Solunskom samitu obećano članstvo u Evropskoj uniji, ali u Briselu trenutno vidimo u najmanju ruku nekoliko jakih signala da se sačeka sa daljim proširenjem Evropske unije. Međutim, ovo ne znači da bi Bosna i Hercegovina trebala biti pasivna ili neaktivna na tom polju. Štaviše, smatram da postoji niz prilika za Bosnu i Hercegovinu i njenu vanjsku politiku, a ovdje mislim na značaj energičnog približavanja Bosne i Hercegovine članovima Višegradske grupe koji su ujedno članice Evropske unije sa jakim interesom da zemlje Zapadnog Balkana pristupe Evropskoj uniji. Stoga bi se Bosna i Hercegovina trebala energično približavati saveznicima i partnerima u Evropi kako bi ubrzala rješavanje pitanja evropskih integracija.

Nadalje smatram, a vraćamo se na ranije komentare o ekonomiji, da Bosna i Hercegovina ima jak, dodatan interes da stimuliše ekonomiju kako bi bila konkurentnija, jer što je bolje stanje njene ekonomije, to su jači i zahtjevi da postane članica Unije. Tako da postoji niz koraka koje Bosna i Hercegovina može i koje bi trebala da poduzme kako bi poboljšala izglede za njeno članstvo u Evropskoj uniji. Smatram da bi međunarodna zajednica trebala pomoći Bosni i Hercegovini da to postigne. To su prvi elementi. Ranije smo govorili i o poplavama. Obećana je značajna pomoć donatora i smatram da međunarodna zajednica ovdje ima jasnu ulogu, rekao bih čak obavezu, ne samo da ova pomoć dođe do pojedinaca, već i da vidi koje su potrebe na licu mjesta i na koji način može pomoći žrtvama poplava. Ovo je još jedno pitanje u koje bi se međunarodna zajednica trebala direktno uključiti.

Posljednje pitanje je ponovo u vezi sa evropskim integracijama. Smatram da Evropska unija, koja na međunarodnom frontu trenutno ima vodeću ulogu u Bosni i Hercegovini, ima jasnu odgovornost da bude asertivna u vezi sa svojim uslovima ali i da ima jasnu viziju gdje želi vidjeti Bosnu i Hercegovinu u pogledu na institucije i na Ustav u trenutku kada bude pristupala Evropskoj uniji. Nedavno sam objavio knjigu u kojoj pozivam Brisel da postavi specifične, dodatne zahtjeve u vidu službenog dokumenta koji bi poslao jasnu poruku svakome u Bosni i Hercegovini da samo ujedinjena Bosna i Hercegovina, koja ima dovoljno jak i efikasan centralni nivo vlasti za ispunjenje pretpristupnih obaveza, može postati članica Evropske unije. Kada bi Evropska unija jasno i od samog početka postavila ove uslove, onda bi to diskreditiralo sve političke aktivnosti koji su u suprotnosti sa ovim ciljevima. Smatram ovo važnim s obzirom na to da smo dan-dva nakon objavljivanja službenih izbornih rezultata čuli neke od političkih aktera kako pozivaju na stvaranje trećeg entiteta i na vraćanje niza inicijativa koje bi zemlju pokrenule unazad, a ne prema naprijed. Izuzetno je važno da Evropska unija odredi agendu i postavi okvir u kojem bi se odvijao progres Bosne i Hercegovine.

Mislim da uvijek postoje fluktuacije i da organizacije i politički subjekti uvijek moraju savladati nove situacije i goruća pitanja. Kada govorimo o procesu integracije Bosne i Hercegovine, onda govorimo o dugoročnom procesu, tako da će sigurno biti trenutaka tokom ovog procesa kada će druga pitanja biti urgentnija. Kada pogledamo unazad, onda vidimo da je Evropa proživjela i prevazišla mnoge krize, kao što su ruska invazija Gruzije ili pregovori sa Iranom. Uvijek postoji pitanje na dnevnom redu koje će apsorbirati više energije i koji će se smatrati hitnim.

Nadalje, činjenica da trenutno postoje goruća pitanja ni u kojem smislu ne znači da Evropa nije zainteresirana da jedinstvena i funkcionalna Bosna i Hercegovina postane članica Unije. Evropi nije u interesu da Uniji pristupi disfunkcionalna zemlja, s obzirom na značajne probleme sa kojima se suočila sa pristupanjem Kipra. Smatram da mnogi u Briselu uviđaju da je izuzetno bitno da se ovi problemi rješavaju prije nego zemlje pristupe Uniji, jer u suprotnom postaju izvor velikih glavobolja za Uniju. U tom smislu, bez obzira na kratkoročne prioritete Unije i na kratkoročne krize, smatram da postoji jasan interes Evropske unije da se pobrine za to da se Bosna i Hercegovina razvija na način koji će omogućiti zemlji da pristupi Evropskoj uniji kao funkcionalna, racionalna i ujedinjena država.”

“The international community has a number of interests and this affects Bosnia’s foreign policy. So on the foreign policy side I think that the Bosnian government will most probably be asked to address a number of issues that are currently ranking high on the international agenda.

For example the issue of the foreign fighters who are joining the battlegrounds in Syria and Iraq, for sure this is a very high priority here in Washington and I expect that the government in Bosnia will be required to take a number of concrete actions to curb the flow of foreign fighters to those countries. The Obama administration pushed extremely hard in September for the adoption of a resolution on the Security Council which imposed a number of obligations for countries to do that. And Bosnia has followed through and has conducted a series of operations, portraying itself as a reliable and serious actor in these efforts. It’s not a problem that pertains only to Bosnia, we see it throughout Western Europe, we see it in my own country Canada. All the governments are tackling these issues and I expect that Bosnia will be required to tackle this issue.

The second element I think that will affect the government’s foreign policy pertains through the Euro-Atlantic integration. I think that this should rank extremely high on the foreign policy agenda of the Bosnian government. We are seeing signals now in Brussels that member states are quite reluctant to move forward with the enlargement and the promise of EU-membership has been made in Thessaloniki to the Western-Balkan states, but we are seeing now in Brussels at the very least a number of strong signals to take a pause in the enlargement. But that doesn’t mean that Bosnia should be passive or inactive on that front. On the contrary, I think there are a number of opportunities for Bosnia and for its foreign policy and I’m thinking here about the importance for Bosnia to engage very energetically with the members of the Višegrad group who are members of the European Union who have a strong interest in seeing the countries of the Western Balkans in the European Union. So Bosnia should engage very energetically with its allies and partners within Europe in order to push forward the European integration agenda.

I also think, and that goes back to the comments that we were making earlier on the economy, I think that Bosnia has a very strong additional interest to stimulate its economy to be more competitive economically, because the stronger its economic condition will be, the stronger its claim for membership will become as well. So there are a number of things that Bosnia can do now and should be doing in order to enhance its prospects for EU membership. I think that the international community should accompany Bosnia as it does that. Those are the first elements.

We were talking about the floods early on. A lot of donor assistance has been pledged and I think that the international community has a clear role here, I would even say a responsibility not only to make sure that these pledges reach individuals but also to looking at whatever other needs might be on the ground and to provide assistance to flood victims. That is another topic where the international community should be directly engaged.

The last item I think goes back to European integrations. I think the European Union, which has now a leadership role on the international front in Bosnia, has a clear responsibility to be more assertive in its conditions and also to be clear as to where it wants Bosnia and Herzegovina to be institutionally and constitutionally when it enters the European Union. I’ve published a book recently in which I argue for specific, additional requirements that are to be set up by Brussels in a formal act that sends a very clear message to everyone in Bosnia that only a unified Bosnia with a sufficiently strong and efficient central level of government to undertake European membership obligations should be allowed in the European Union. If the European Union set these conditions very clearly and formally from the outset, the positive impact of this would be that it would discredit any political action on the ground that goes against those objectives. And I think this is very important given that we’ve seen that one or two days after the official results of the elections political actors calling for the creation of the third entity and going back to a number of initiatives that would take the country backward rather than forward. It’s extremely important for the European Union to set the agenda and establish a framework in which Bosnia’s progress should take place.

I think that there are always fluctuations and organizations and political entities always have to juggle new situations and emergencies. When we are talking about Bosnia’s integration progress we are talking about a very long term process, so obviously there will be moments in that process when other items on the agenda will be more urgent. If we look back, we see that Europe has gone through and has had to manage many crises, the Russian incursion into Georgia or the negotiations with Iran. There is always an item on the agenda that will absorb more energy and be considered an emergency.

That being said, the fact that there are pressing issues right now does not in any way suggest that Europe doesn’t have an interest in having a unified and functional Bosnia within the Union. Europe has no interest in having a dysfunctional country entering the European Union, like it has faced significant problems with the Cyprus issue and I think that many people in Brussels realize that it is extremely important to manage these issues before countries enter the Union rather than after because then it becomes a source of very important headaches for the Union. So in that sense, regardless of the short-term priorities of the Union or the shot-term crisis I think that there is a clear interest for the European Union to make sure that Bosnia evolves in a way that allows the country to enter the European Union and to enter it as a functional, rational and unified state.”