ŽUPLJANIN: CELEBRATION OF MARCH 1 SHOWS FULL ABSURDITY OF BiH

BANJA LUKA, FEBRUARY 24 /SRNA/ - Republika Srpska will never mark the so-called Independence Day of BiH, because the celebration of March 1, when a Serbian wedding guest was brutally killed in Sarajevo's Baščaršija, shows the full absurdity of BiH as it currently exists, said Slobodan Župljanin, president of the Organization of Senior Officers of the Republika Srpska Army.

Župljanin said that the Federation of BiH /FBiH/ is the only place in the world that celebrates death, specifically, a death at a wedding celebration, and that, even more disturbingly, it continues to receive congratulations for this from some Western diplomats.

He stated that March 1, 1992, serves as a warning for the Serbs about where they might have ended up had it not been for January 9 and February 28 of the same year, as well as for the unwavering determination of the Serb people to never allow anyone else to decide on their behalf.

Župljanin emphasized that the Serb people remember March 1, 1992, only as a day of tragedy, and that on that day all Serbs in Republika Srpska sympathize with the innocent Serb wedding guest Nikola Gardović.

He said that it is well known that no law on holidays has ever been adopted at the level of BiH, and that such a holiday, marked in the FBiH, does not exist either in practice or in law.

Slobodan Župljanin added that March 1, 1992, was also the second day of an illegitimate referendum on the independence of BiH, organized against the will of the Serb people.

He said that the Serb people had previously, through a plebiscite, already declared themselves in favor of remaining in the common state of Yugoslavia, and that in BiH, then still a Yugoslav republic, the overall atmosphere was on the verge of overheating and rupture.

"The Assembly of FR BiH, in which the SDA held the largest number of seats, declared independence on the same day based on the results of a referendum in which Serbs did not participate. This was the key trigger and the prelude to the bloody war in BiH. That is why Srpska will never celebrate the so-called Independence Day of BiH," the Organization of Senior Officers of the Republika Srpska Army said in a press release.

In parts of the FBiH with a Bosniak majority, March 1 is marked as the so-called Independence Day of BiH, as an illegal referendum on independence and secession from the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was held on that date 32 years ago. Serbs in Republika Srpska remember March 1 for the killing of a Serb wedding guest in Sarajevo, which also served as the trigger for the outbreak of the war.

This tragic date is not celebrated in Republika Srpska; instead, November 21 is observed, the day when the General Framework Agreement for Peace in BiH was initialed at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, marking the end of the civil war in BiH.