President of Republika Srpska (Serb Republic) Milorad Dodik attends a meeting with Russia's President Vladimir Putin on the sidelines of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) in Saint Petersburg, Russia June 6, 2024. REUTERS/Anton Vaganov/Pool
SARAJEVO (Reuters) - The United States on Wednesday expanded sanctions against an individual and an entity who have helped Bosnian Serb nationalist leader Milorad Dodik and his son evade existing U.S. sanctions, the U.S. Treasury Department said in a statement.
Dodik, the pro-Russian president of Bosnia's autonomous Serb Republic (RS) who has long advocated the region's secession from Bosnia, is already under U.S. and UK sanctions.
In October 2023, Washington imposed sanctions against his two adult children - son Igor Dodik and daughter Gorica Dodik - and their companies, saying they facilitated the Bosnian Serb leader's ongoing corruption.
In June 2024, the U.S. imposed sanctions on two individuals and a network of companies generating wealth for Dodik and Igor Dodik, who has continued to control the firms officially run by individuals loyal to him.
On Wednesday, the U.S. Treasury Department said that Vladimir Perisic, the general director of Prointer ITSS, a company that was sanctioned in June, has continued to execute business decisions based on guidance by Igor Dodik.
It also said that the sanctioned Kaldera company has been replaced by a new company, Elpring, which has been effectively controlled by Igor Dodik. It therefore added both Perisic and Elpring to the sanctions list.
The United States says Dodik has undermined the 1995 Dayton Peace Agreement that ended the 1992-1995 Bosnian war in which 100,000 were killed. The pact divided the country into two autonomous regions, the Serb Republic and the Bosniak-Croat Federation, linked via a weak central government.
The new sanctions come on the day Donald Trump secured his second U.S. presidency, welcomed by Dodik.
(Reporting by Daria Sito-Sucic; Editing by Alexandra Hudson)
