Bosnia-Herzegovina's tripartite state presidency confirmed Thursday in Sarajevo that it would convene Friday to discuss the resignation of the country's prime minister, according to dpa. Nikola Spiric, the chairman of Bosnia-Herzegovina's central government, the Council of Ministers, announced his resignation earlier Thursday. "I wish to inform Bosnia-Herzegovina's public that I have officially sent my resignation to the (state) presidency. I also informed the ministers that the government will work under a technical mandate from now on," Spiric told reporters in Sarajevo. He said he resigned due to his disagreement with the measures of the international administrator in Bosnia-Herzegovina to streamline the decision-making process in the country's central government and parliament. Spiric said Bosnia-Herzegovina has not been a sovereign state in the 12 years since the Dayton Peace Agreement was signed to stop the 1992-1995 bloodshed in the Balkans country. Instead, he said, foreigners lead the country, which is not a "happy solution." "Unfortunately, political leaders in Bosnia-Herzegovina have not been devoted to their country, but to the international community," Spiric added. Two weeks ago the international community's High Representative to Bosnia, Slovak diplomat Miroslav Lajcak, suggested changes to the voting system in the two institutions aimed at improving their functionality. The proposal immediately provoked sharp reactions from Bosnian Serb officials who accused Lajcak of violating the country's constitution and harming Serb interests. Bosnian Serb officials, led by the Party of Independent Social- Democrats (SNSD) of the Bosnian Serb Premier Milorad Dodik, threatened to leave the country's central institutions if Lajcak refused to change his decision. Spiric, an SNSD member himself, said he resigned of his own freewill, regardless of moves by the SNSD. "Nikola Spiric's decision to resign is his right and his choice, but it is not a responsible action," Lajcak said. "It will not calm the current political situation." Lajcak also said it was paradoxical that "the Chairman of the Council of Ministers should resign over measures that are designed to make the council, the body that he chairs, more efficient," he said. According to Bosnia-Herzegovina's law on the Council of Ministers, the country's presidency is in charge of nominating the chairman of the council, who then suggests the government. With the resignation of the premier the entire government, including its nine ministers, is dismissed but continues to function in a technical mandate until the new government is established.
