Lavrov on NATO's Latest Balkan Destabilization Attempts

Mentioned during answers to media questions at a joint news conference following talks with President of the Republika Srpska (Bosnia and Herzegovina) Milorad Dodik, Moscow, September 9, 2025

Lavrov met with President Dodik and entertained the media with remarks and a Q&A session where Mr. Dodik also participated as Lavrov indicates in his answers. The main point at issue continues to be NATO/EU manipulation of the Dayton Accords in a continuing effort to destabilize the Balkan region via its longstanding campaign against Serbian Slavs. There’s a video with English voice-over of the event here that begins at the 28-minute mark that provides what Mr. Dodik had to say that takes some concentration to hear clearly that’s the only source I could find for his POV. Some of the context for Mr. Dodik’s remarks can be discerned from Lavrov’s responses. Overall, what’s provided by Lavrov gives us a good update as to what NATO/EU continues to do in the region that IMO serves as a distraction from what’s happening in Ukraine and elsewhere within Europe. Izvestia published this short report in English about Mr. Dodik’s intent:

On August 9, President of Republika Srpska Milorad Dodik announced that he had asked Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, through the UN system, to help close the office of the High Representative to Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) Christian Schmidt.

"It was an opportunity for me to ask the Minister [of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation Lavrov] through the system [of the Organization]. The United Nations should help to close this office of the high Representative, which was supposed to be a year old, but remained for 30 years," Dodik said at a press conference in Moscow following talks with Lavrov.

According to him, "unauthorized Schmidt" creates "a complete mess in Bosnia, so much so that he endangers Dayton."

With that bit of context provided, we move to Lavrov’s remarks and the Q&A:

Dear Colleagues,

Today, we continued constructive communication and established trust-based contacts with the President of the friendly Republika Srpska, Mr Milorad Dodik, and his team.

We reviewed the progress of our joint work on the issues discussed during the meetings between President of the Republika Srpska Milorad Dodik and President of Russia Vladimir Putin.

We paid special attention to practical issues related to the development of our bilateral cooperation. We discussed the schedule of contacts at the level of various ministries and departments. We noted productive sustainable work in the energy sector. We noted significant progress in the cultural, humanitarian and educational areas, including in connection with the construction of a Russian-Serbian church and a spiritual centre. Mr. President gave us materials telling us how the construction of the church is being completed and the transition to its decoration begins. We appreciate the attention paid to the Russian language in Republika Srpska. More than 12 thousand schoolchildren are already studying it.

We talked about cooperation through the media. I would like to note that we discussed international issues, primarily from the point of view of what is happening in Bosnia and Herzegovina. This is all the more symbolic since it was on September 9 that the Republika Srpska remembers the victims of the bombing as part of NATO's Operation Deliberate Force. Today marks the 30th anniversary of that aggression and the 30th anniversary of the signing in December 1995 of the Dayton Accords, the general framework agreements for peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Russia is one of the guarantors of this important treaty. We had a detailed exchange of views on the situation with its implementation and with the Bosnian settlement based on the Dayton principles in general. We emphasised that there is no alternative to preserving all the cornerstone postulates of Dayton. It is on them that the post-conflict architecture of Bosnia and Herzegovina is built, which was approved by the UN Security Council by consensus and without any reservations. I mean the equality of the three state-forming peoples (Serbs, Croats and Muslim Bosniaks) and the equality of two entities–-the Republika Srpska and the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which include Bosniaks and Croats. These two entities, in accordance with Dayton, should have broad constitutional powers.

We noted and listed a large number of facts that all these principles approved by the UN Security Council continue to be grossly flouted by the Westerners, who are acting more and more brazenly. Their destructive plans are obvious (they do not particularly hide them) – to gain undivided control over Bosnia and Herzegovina, to deprive the Serbs of the rights guaranteed by Dayton, to turn the country into a unitary state with an obedient government, judicial and other authorities.

This has led to the fact that today we are witnessing the most acute political crisis in the country over the past thirty years, which, without exaggeration, is fraught with destabilization of the entire Balkan region.

We emphasised that German citizen Karl Schmidt, who poses as a "high representative" in Bosnia and Herzegovina, continues to play an unseemly role in the unprecedented degradation of interethnic dialogue in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in provoking disintegration processes. His candidacy, contrary to the procedure defined in the Dayton Agreement, was not approved by the UN Security Council, but was secretly and illegally carried out by the Westerners in the absence of an international and intra-Bosnian consensus and bypassing the UN Security Council.

We clearly state the inadmissibility of external interference in Bosnian affairs, in particular in the competence of the judicial and electoral institutions of Bosnia and Herzegovina in the form of the relevant structures and entities. In this context, we strongly condemn attempts to remove from power Serbian leaders who are objectionable to the West, in particular, our today's interlocutor, our friend, the legitimately elected legitimate President of the Republika Srpska, Milorad Dodik, through fabricated criminal cases.

It is striking that this attempt is being made under the pretext of making criminal charges against Mr Dodik. As Karl Schmidt put it, it is that Mr Dodik does not carry out the orders and decisions of Karl Schmidt. In a normal state governed by the rule of law, it is difficult to imagine a self-appointed "Gauleiter" (if we are talking about Germany) trying to usurp all power in a sovereign state, whose rights are clearly indicated in UN Security Council decisions. It is actively assisted by the Constitutional Court, which, thanks to the efforts of the West, still remains in a state controlled by the European Union, because so far three members of the Constitutional Court are appointed from the outside, thereby preventing the Bosnians, Serbs, Croats and Bosniaks themselves from normally resolving their internal processes, determining judicial issues and decisions through a mutual balance of interests.

For its part, Russia reaffirmed that, as a permanent member of the UN Security Council and one of the guarantors of the Dayton Accords, it will continue its efforts to support this important document and the forces that are fighting to preserve and unconditionally respect the Dayton Principles in practice.

We will pay special attention to this topic in October 2025, when Russia will chair the UN Security Council. The next meeting on Bosnia and Herzegovina is scheduled for October 31, 2025. Many of our colleagues will have to answer uncomfortable, but absolutely legitimate questions.

I consider our meeting to be very timely. We agreed to continue our mutually beneficial dialogue with our friends from the Republika Srpska.

I thank Milorad Dodik for this meeting.

Question: As you stated during the talks, the most important thing is the problem of imposing a self-proclaimed foreigner, "High Representative" Karl Schmidt. How would you comment on the fact that there is an attempt to remove the legitimately elected President of Republika Srpska? We constantly hear statements from some Western countries and Bosnian politicians from Sarajevo about Russian, as they say, "pernicious" influence in the region. Can you comment on this?

Sergey Lavrov: The statement about Russia's "pernicious" influence in the region is not alone. There are many claims that all the troubles on this planet stem from the behavior of the Russian Federation. There is a lot of fake news that is introduced into world public opinion and used in the UN to hinder the work of the bodies of this world organization.

Among the latest examples is the notorious investigation of terrorist attacks on the Nord Stream gas pipelines. They will be three years old in a few weeks. Now they have begun to say that these were terrorist attacks after all. Even in Germany, this is already recognized. But no one is even going to make any transparency in the investigation, attempts to allow the Russian side to investigate in response to our requests, since it was the owner of these gas pipelines.

There are many other examples. Starting with the Malaysian Boeing, which crashed in Ukraine in July 2014, the investigation into its crash was extremely non-transparent. Suffice it to say that the Americans and Ukrainians refused to provide data from their radars, the Americans refused to provide data from satellites, and almost all witnesses, except one, were anonymous, their names are still unknown. But the "fair" Dutch court also accused the Russian Federation.

Perhaps the most "anecdotal" case is the tragedy in early April 2022 in the Kyiv suburb of Bucha, where, two days after Russian troops withdrew as a gesture of goodwill to allow a negotiated solution to take place, BBC correspondents suddenly showed the whole world the corpses neatly laid along the main street of this settlement with their hands tied. Of course, the Russian Federation was blamed for everything. Then there was a new wave of sanctions, you know that. Since then, since April 2022, we have not been able to get an answer from anyone – neither from the Kiev authorities, nor from the UN human rights agencies, nor from the UN Secretary-General himself – to the simple question – is it possible to look at the names of those people whose corpses were shown with such pathos on the BBC? No one even wants to talk about this topic, because the news occasion has taken place, the propaganda "foam" has been removed, Russia has been accused, and then searching for the truth is no longer what the West is doing.

Quite recently, we almost "ruined" Ursula von der Leyen, who flew by plane to various countries, "instigating" them against our country. Suddenly, they said that Russia had turned off GPS and its plane could have crashed. Then the representatives of the European Union themselves disavowed this "nonsense", but the methods remain the same.

As for the Republika Srpska. Today, we discussed this in detail with President Milorad Dodik, saying that the UN Security Council did not appoint the impostor Karl Schmidt, and any person who is not appointed by the Security Council and calls himself a "high representative" is not someone who has any authority. This impostor decides that everyone who disagrees with his "rulings" on any issue, that is, everyone who disagrees with him, falls under a criminal article. How do you like it? Mr Dodik has just described in detail the origin of this "character", his political career and historical predilections. I can only say one thing. In the face of this "character" we see the personification of the West's policy of carrying out "color revolutions", simply put, coups d'état.

As for our common region, the first coup d'état took place in 2008, when Kosovo's independence was unilaterally proclaimed in flagrant violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1244. Isn't this a coup d'état? The Security Council, the highest international legal body, determined the parameters of Serbia's statehood, and Western countries destroyed this statehood, thus, of course, committing a coup d'état.

In 2014, there was a coup d'état in Ukraine. There is not even much to remind you of. This is on everyone's lips about how the legitimate President Viktor Yanukovych was overthrown. President Vladimir Putin recently recalled this in his speeches at various forums. He was overthrown because he did not want to join NATO and did not want to join the European Union at the expense of the deterioration of his economic trade relations with the Russian Federation, but wanted to find a balance of interests. The West does not want to look for any balance, no interests other than its own.

Following these coups, a real coup d'état is now taking place in Bosnia and Herzegovina, where the state structure approved by the Security Council is being "broken" by an impostor who has no powers other than the fact that the West is "goading" him to implement his plans for the Republika Srpska. I draw your attention to the fact that in all three cases, in all three coups d'état, we are talking about the suppression of the legitimate rights of the Slavs, the Orthodox. This is also a fairly serious characteristic of the current policy of leaders in Brussels, Paris, Berlin and a number of other capitals. Not to mention London, which is not a member of the European Union, but is very actively and successfully helping the Brussels bureaucracy dictate to everyone else how to continue its Russophobic, anti-Orthodox and anti-Slavic policy.

Question: What message can Moscow send to the participants in the political life of the Republika Srpska in this difficult situation?

Sergey Lavrov: I would like to address not only the participants in the political life of the Republika Srpska, but also those who are engaged in politics in another entity, the two other state-forming peoples–-Muslim Bosniaks and Croats. Because they are also responsible for how they, as their political leadership, implement the decision of the UN Security Council to approve the Dayton Peace Accords. The fact that the West has long led the Bosniaks astray and is trying to split the Croatian state-forming people has long been obvious to everyone.

Against this background, for many years and decades, the Republika Srpska, led by Milorad Dodik and his team, has consistently upheld the Dayton Principles. I would like to draw your attention, as Mr. President has just done, to the blatant violation by the West and its proxies in Bosnia and Herzegovina of all the principles that should have the force of law as decisions of the Security Council. All UN member states are obliged to comply with the decisions of the Security Council.

My message to the Republika Srpska and the Muslim-Croat Federation is that we must have a conscience and comply with the demands of the international community, which ensured the creation of the State of Bosnia and Herzegovina on the basis of a balance of interests among the three constituent peoples. To destroy the consensus that underpins Bosnia and Herzegovina is, by and large, a crime, because it is an invitation to another war in the Balkans. This is an attempt to destabilise the situation, provoke a military scenario and then (I have no doubts, they do not hide it) use this military scenario to use brute military force to suppress the Serbs, as is now happening in Kosovo.

Therefore, the message is this: be decent people, everyone who is involved in politics in Bosnia and Herzegovina, fulfill your obligations. I am not sure that I will be heard in the Federation, and especially that I will be heard by the authorities in Sarajevo and in those European capitals who manipulate and direct these authorities. But this is our position. I am convinced that we need to fight for justice, for truth. She's on our side. We need to defend it.

Question (retranslated from Serbian): Can we say today that there is a redistribution of spheres of influence in the world and how this can affect the Balkans?

Sergey Lavrov: I do not think that we can talk about the redistribution of spheres of influence at the current historical stage in the sense in which we all understood this term ("redistribution of spheres of influence") in past historical eras.

In past historical epochs, spheres of influence were divided mainly through the use of military force. The countries that were engaged in redistribution, as a rule, had serious (in a good sense) claims, primarily economic ones, since they were the leaders of the corresponding parts of the world in terms of economic development. Remember the results of World War II, the creation of NATO, followed by the creation of the Warsaw Pact, the socialist camp. At that time, analysts also called it the "division of spheres of influence"–-the Western part of humanity and the part of humanity that was inspired by the ideals of justice, freedom, equality, fraternity, Marxism-Leninism, etc.

Now the process of establishing multipolarity is underway. It is not that someone is trying to "carve out" some zone in which he or she will influence. There are such attempts, such relapses do happen, but the objective, fundamental process (President Vladimir Putin spoke about this again at the Eastern Economic Forum) is the process of multipolarity, when countries naturally become leaders through accelerated economic development, through the successful resolution of social issues, through the development of science and technology. New centers of leadership in the economy and finance are emerging, and with this comes political influence.

The BRICS member countries and the leaders of the SCO are precisely the new centres of growth, development and influence in the modern world. People are drawn to them (under their influence, if you will) not because someone is "driven there", but because it is beneficial for other countries to join and be associated with the natural process of forming economic growth and technological independence. The most important thing is to be associated with the process of developing equal cooperation.

Yes, influence is redistributed in the world, but the influence that exists now is based on a natural, objective process of development, when being determines consciousness, and not someone's consciousness is imposed on you so that you arrange your existence according to someone else's patterns.

In this sense, the way the citizens of the respective countries assess what is happening is of decisive importance. We are seeing how the problems of ordinary people are being solved in China, India, and other BRICS and SCO member countries. The opinion of the people becomes decisive precisely by these indicators, and not in the context of certain election campaigns in some Western countries, when, clinging to power, topics are artificially thrown in that distract from real problems, as is now the case in most European states, when they try to push aside a sharp, obvious decline in the well-being of their citizens, their voters, in every possible way inflating the Ukrainian problem under the slogan that Vladimir Zelensky defends "European values" and they must be with him to the end. And the fact that Vladimir Zelensky defends approaches to the legislative extermination of the Russian language, culture, education and the media, and the fact that he has banned the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church, does not bother anyone. If it is stated that Ukraine defends "European values", then this is a confession. These are the "values" that Europe defends, in fact, returning to the ideology of Nazism.

From the point of view of the people's attitude towards their leaders, I would like to mention the referendum that Republika Srpska and President Milorad Dodik are planning for October 25 in order to decide whether the citizens of the Republika Srpska support the course pursued by the leadership of this Republika Srpska or not. I think it's fair. The West does not like referendums. Kosovo's independence was declared without any referendum. The referendum in Crimea, which everyone had the opportunity to see, monitor, and which was extremely transparent, was not recognised.

In recent years, Europe has not really wanted to hear the voice of the people. Therefore, to come to the people and say, "You see how we work, what you think about it, I think this is honest and worthy of politicians of our time." This is a bold and correct step. [My Emphasis]

The Outlaw US Empire always aims to eliminate the allies/proxies of the nation that’s the main target, which we now see very clearly in West Asia and ought to have clearly seen in Europe after the USSR fell. The global war for total control by the Empire never ceased with the USSR’s fall. Instead as most know, GHW Bush proclaimed the “New World Order” and an economic war was unleashed against all former USSR entities in a severity determined by how subservient the new governments would be to the Empire/NATO. As now well proven, the word of the West is worthless as it has abandoned the international rule of law as Lavrov noted. In a sense, there are again two “spheres of influence” defined by obedience to Law—the Global Majority—and the no-rules “Rules-based System,” meaning the Outlaws of which NATO/EU are major members doing the bidding of their masters in America.

Fortunately for those in the Balkans, NATO is mostly demilitarized and is far weaker than it was in the 1990s when war was waged in the region by and for NATO. Russia is also much stronger now and has a tool it could employ against Brussels, although I’m sure Russia would rather not—Oreshnik. The key IMO is law enforcement, in this case the Dayton Accords and its UNSCR equivalent. We already see the Outlaws’ position as they assume they have leverage, but do they really, and how much effort will Trump devote to this issue when it appears he wants to divest most Outlaw US Empire involvement in Ukraine. And then there’s the question of how other Europeans will see and react to more antidemocratic efforts by EU/NATO as their living standards plumet so war can continue to be waged in Ukraine and perhaps elsewhere. For those wondering just where is BiH, here’s a map:

And another map showing its relation to its Balkan neighbors:

As is plain to see, Divide and Rule was implemented in the Balkas with a ferocity that will be hard to undo since it’s the product of centuries of implementation by several different Empires.

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