UN Security Council blasts Bosnian leadership

The Security Council on 12 January voted unanimously to demand that the members of the three-strong Bosnian joint presidency implement pledges they made in New York last November to further develop joint institutions in keeping with the 1995 Dayton agreement (see "RFE/RL South Slavic Report," 13 January 2000). Council President and U.S. Ambassador Richard Holbrooke told reporters: "I am here today to express our considerable annoyance at the delays.... The joint presidency, its central institutions, and many attributes of a single, sovereign, centrally-governed state...have not been fulfilled," Reuters reported. Holbrooke, who was the architect of the 1995 peace agreement, noted that the return of refugees and displaced persons is proceeding too slowly. He also criticized powerful local nationalist warlords for blocking implementation of the Dayton agreement. Holbrooke stressed that such individuals are "just criminals, crooks, disguising their crookedness under the guise of...nationalism." PM