Sarajevo - The future of Bosnia's Serb republic may be decided this weekend when voters get their chance to choose between rivals in a bitter power struggle. President Biljana Plavsic is fighting to increase her support against nationalist hard-liners in elections today and tomorrow for a new parliament in the Republika Srpska.
Mrs Plavsic, who is based in the western town of Banja Luka, dissolved the parliament last July after she began accusing her Pale-based opponents of corruption and running smuggling rackets. She said they were backed by Dr Radovan Karadzic, the indicted war criminal who is supported by most members of the ruling Serb Democratic Party.
One of its most powerful leaders is Mr Momcilo Krajisnik, currently the Serb member of the Bosnian collective presidency and a key rival of Mrs Plavsic. At a rally held this week near Srebrenica, the Muslim town taken by the Bosnian Serbs in 1995, he criticised his opponent. "Plavsic and her supporters have betrayed the Serb people," he said.
Yesterday, international supervisors said they had disqualified three SDS candidates because the party failed to remove posters bearing Dr Karadzic's portrait. The judicial arm of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) made good on a threat delivered on Thursday to strike candidates from the SDS if they filed to remove such posters. It said in a statement it would strike two additional candidates for every day that posters of Dr Karadzic remain on display.