PETROVIĆ: COMMISSION APPOINTMENT PROCESS MARKED BY ABUSES AND CONTROVERSY

ISTOČNO SARAJEVO, JUNE 30 /SRNA/ – Dušan Petrović, chief of staff to the Serb member of the BiH Presidency, said in a statement to SRNA that Alija Kožljak, chief of staff to Presidency Chairperson Denis Bećirović, is trying to convince the public that yesterday's Presidency session adopted a decision appointing members of the Commission to Preserve National Monuments, but that the facts, according to him, indicate otherwise.

Petrović stressed that the entire appointment process was marked by what he described as legal and political abuses, as well as controversies surrounding certain Commission members who, he said, were appointed illegally and by force.

Given that UNESCO was formally involved in the appointment process and that foreign members are appointed to the Commission to Preserve National Monuments of BiH, Petrović said it is absolutely clear that the matter concerns international relations and foreign policy.

"We see that Bećirović's office, through media outlets close to it, is spreading the absurd claim that the Presidency rejected the Serb member's attempt to refer the matter to the National Assembly of Republika Srpska for the protection of a vital national interest. Such a thing is not possible. That is not for the BiH Presidency to decide, but for our National Assembly," Petrović stressed.

He added that if such a procedure were possible, two Presidency members could always deprive the third member of the right to invoke a vital national interest veto, rendering that constitutional mechanism meaningless.

"We have seen over the past decades the importance of the National Assembly and this constitutional instrument in practice, when numerous decisions of the BiH Presidency were overturned and rendered ineffective," Petrović said.