Bosnian Serb leader advocates independence

BELGRADE, Serbia, Sept. 4 (UPI) -- A Bosnian Serb leader Monday said the secession of Serb-run Bosnia from Bosnia-Herzegovina is inevitable in the long term.

Prime Minister Milorad Dodik of the Bosnian Serb-run Republika Srpska entity, said an independence referendum to secede the Serb part of Bosnia cannot be avoided because Bosnia-Herzegovina is untenable as a single state, Serbia's FoNet news agency reported.

Dodik began advocating the referendum idea since Montenegro seceded from the union with Serbia in a May 21 independence referendum, but the concept has been flatly rejected by leaders of the United Nations and the European Union.

Referring to ongoing U.N.-led talks between the Serbian government in Belgrade and Kosovo's ethnic-Albanian leaders on who will govern Serbia's Kosovo province, Dodik said "dissolution" of Kosovo would intensify Bosnian Serbs' wishes for secession.

Dodik said 99 percent of Bosnian Serbs support secession from Bosnia-Herzegovina.

The U.S.-brokered Dayton peace agreement in 1995 ended the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina, declaring it a single state made up of two entities, the Serb-run Republika Srpska and the Muslim-Croatian federation.