As Bosnian Serbs mark controversial national day, US warns celebrations

The United States on Tuesday warned that ongoing celebrations of a Bosnian Serb self-proclaimed national holiday were in violation of Bosnia’s constitution and a 1995 peace agreement, and as such amounted to a criminal offense.
In a statement, the U.S. embassy in Sarajevo urged Bosnia’s legal authorities to “investigate any violations of law” related to the marking of Jan. 9 as the day of the Republika Srpska entity, which is what the part of Bosnia run by ethnic Serbs is called.
The Jan. 9 holiday commemorates the date in 1992 when Bosnian Serbs declared the creation of their own state in Bosnia, igniting the country’s devastating four-year war that killed more than 100,000 people.
During the war, Bosnian Serbs expelled and killed Bosniaks, who are mostly Muslims, and Croats from the territories they controlled.
The conflict ended in 1995 in a U.S.-brokered peace agreement. The so-called Dayton accords created Serb and Bosniak-Croat entities in Bosnia, held together by weak joint central institutions.