Today marks 16 years since the Dayton Accords were initialed, which put an end to the three and a half years' war in Bosnia-Herzegovina (BiH).

On that occasion, President of Republika Srpska (RS) Milorad Dodik stated for the Banjaluka-based daily Glas Srpske that the Dayton Accords offer the only feasible framework for BiH.

“The Dayton Accords were drafted to back the parity of three constituent peoples in BiH, and its violation could lead to BiH becoming a Bosniak country, in which no Serb or Croat could reside,” Dodik said, adding that RS as signatory to the Dayton Treaty is a permanent entity which could not be abolished.

The Dayton Treaty was initialed on November 21, 1995 by president of Serbia Slobodan Milosevic, the Republic of BiH president Alija Izetbegovic and Croatian president Franjo Tudjman following three-week talks at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near the U.S. city of Dayton in order to officially put an end to the war in BiH which lasted from 1992 to 1995.

The agreement was initialed in the presence of the then U.S. Secretary of State Warren Christopher, and U.S. chief intermediaries Richard Holbrooke and General Wesley Clark.

The Dayton Accords were officially signed on December 14, 1995 at the Elysee Palace in Paris. Thus, BiH was divided into two entities - Republika Srpska and the BiH Federation.

Those residing in the territory of the Muslim-Croat Federation are of the opinion that the Dayton Peace Agreement ended the fighting, and qualify it as one of the most successful peace agreement in the world.

However, the BiH parliament has not yet ratified the Dayton Accords due to different interpretations of the document, although its constituent part is the BiH Constitution.