Bosnian Serbs' separatist leader Milorad Dodik called on Thursday for the initiation of a "liberation process" for Republika Srpska during Serbia's statehood day celebrations, held for the first time in the deeply divided Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Leaders from Bosnia's ethnic Serb entity and from Serbia itself were overseeing celebrations in Banja Luka, which will include on Friday the unveiling of two 25-meter (85-foot) flagpoles bearing the flags of Serbia and Republika Srpska (RS).
The holiday marks the first Serbian uprising against the Ottoman Empire in 1804 and has been celebrated in Serbia since 2002.
Since the end of the 1992-1995 war, Bosnia has been split along ethnic lines into two semi-autonomous halves, the Serbs' RS and the Muslim-Croat Federation.
The two are linked by weak central institutions, and each has its own government.
The war started when Belgrade-backed Bosnian Serbs tried to create an “ethnically pure" region with the aim of joining neighboring Serbia by killing and expelling the country's Croats and Bosniaks, who are mostly Muslims.
More than 100,000 people were killed and upward of 2 million, or over half of the country’s population, were driven from their homes before a peace agreement was reached in Dayton, Ohio, late in 1995.
"Republika Srpska is trapped in Bosnia-Herzegovina," Dodik told a ceremony in Banja Luka that was attended by Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic.
"I know that many do not like to hear this, but Republika Srpska must start its process of liberation against Bosnia-Herzegovina because we will not end up well in it."
"That is something that (Bosnian Serb) people feel... We have never identified as Bosnian, never. We have always identified as Serbs only."
Dodik has repeatedly threatened to pull the RS out of Bosnia and is currently on trial for refusing to comply with decisions made by the international envoy for Bosnia, German diplomat Christian Schmidt.
Bosniak Muslim politicians have slammed the statehood celebrations as inflammatory.
"Vucic's attempt to impose Serbia Statehood Day as Statehood Day of the (RS) represents an unprecedented violation of international and national law," wrote Denis Becirovic, the Bosniak Muslim representative of the country's tripartite presidency.
On Thursday, Vucic dismissed such accusations and said Serbia was no one's "enemy."
"We want peace, we want stability and we will preserve that," he said in a speech at the ceremony.
"We love Republika Srpska, (and) respect Bosnia-Herzegovina."
Dodik said that every national holiday in Serbia was a holiday for "every Serb wherever they are, and especially for us in Republika Srpska".
"That's why today is the first time that RS is celebrating its Statehood Day also... it's so normal," he said.
