Bosnian Serb Entity Moves to Form Reservist Police Force

Bringing back an idea from 2019 and citing a lack of police officers, the Republika Srpska government voted in favour of law amendments allowing the Serb entity to establish a controversial reservist police force.

Azem Kurtic, June 23, 2025

Republika Srpska police march during a parade to mark the 27th anniversary of the Republika Srpska, January 2019. Photo: EPA-EFE/VLADIMIR STOJAKOVIC.

The government of Bosnia’s Serb-dominated Republika Srpska entity voted on Monday in favour of legal amendments which would allow the Serb entity to set up a controversial reservist police force. 

Voting under an urgent procedure, the government approved the amendments of a policing and internal affairs law that would allow them to form the new force. 

Speaking to the media, Republika Srpska Interior Minister Sinisa Karan said that the decision comes because the entity needs more than a 1,000 police officers during what he described as “emergency situations such as floods, fires, landslides, and so on”.

“We defined it in the law as a reserve police force. This has nothing to do with any paramilitary formation or something like that. It’s a reserve,” Karan told the media. 

However, when the same idea was introduced back in 2019, it came under criticism from Bosniak war victims’ groups and from Bosnia and Herzegovina’s Western allies because Bosnian Serb reservist police officers were involved in a series of war crimes during the 1992-95 Bosnian conflict. 

The proposal allows the Interior Ministry to establish a reservist police force when there is a need for a large number of officers, with recruitment carried out through a public competition. 

The decision to deploy the reservist force is made by the Interior Minister on the recommendation of the Police Director. During their deployment, members of the reserve force are subject to the provisions of the Law on Police relating to the rights and duties of police officers. 

The Interior Minister of Bosnia’s Bosniak and Croat-dominated Federation entity, Ramo Isak, announced that if Republika Srpska introduces the reservist police force, the Federation will do the same.

Both entities planned to do the same in 2019, but following pressure, Republika Srpska shelved the proposal and formed the heavily armed gendarmerie unit in response. 

Igor Crnadak, vice-president of the opposition Party of Democratic Progress questioned the Republika Srpska authorities’ sanity over plans to form an auxiliary police force, recalling that terms like “territorial defence” and “reserve police” once signalled troubling times, referring to the 1992-95 war in the country. 

The proposed amendments still need to be confirmed by lawmakers in the National Assembly of Republika Srpska.

Copyright BIRN 2007