The Balkans: Bosnia

Pick a Region:. . The Balkans:. . Bosnia

It remains to be seen whether the three national groups of Bosnia can fashion a unified government that can stand on its own after the withdrawal of IFOR. Economic recovery will also prove to be a major challenge, especially since it will require all three territorial entities within Bosnia to think of the common good.

The biggest problem in the future will probably be the disposition of the parts of Bosnia that are currently run by the Republic's Serbian and Croatian minorities. Since people in these regions consider themselves Serbian or Croatian by nationality, and only Bosnian by political accident, it is unlikely that they will accept the current borders of Bosnia as inviolable. If they were to secede from Bosnia (as the Republika Srpska did in 1992), they would probably attach themselves very quickly to their neighboring mother states. This process of secession and reattachment to the ethnic homeland is known in history as enosis. Arguably, enosis with Albania is the fate that also awaits the region of Kosovo if its expelled population is allowed to return and decide its own fate. Photo courtesy of UNHCR Media and Public Affairs Unit