From Louise Arbour and Gen. Wesley Clark, Foreign Policy:  Paradoxically, this is precisely the time for NATO to forge a closer alliance with Bosnia, a process that began last Thursday in Tallinn, Estonia. A meeting of the alliance’s foreign ministers agreed to give Bosnia and Herzegovina a Membership Action Plan (MAP) — a welcome step toward maintain the country’s tenuous hold on peace and stability. …

A closer link to NATO can help build up this common sense of purpose and calm things at home. Much of the current tension in Bosnia exists because all parties feel insecure about the future structure of the Bosnian state and their status within it. Having a MAP with NATO can give all sides a sense of security, making them more confident about undertaking necessary institutional changes, even when politically difficult. With NATO’s help, reform can also be gradual; Macedonia has been in the MAP program since 1999 and is now ready to start accession talks with the European Union. …

The first test for Bosnian leadership will come even before day one of this new NATO engagement. Bosnian leaders have already been told that their MAP will formally begin only when the military bases and properties needed by the armed forces are registered as state property — not as the separate property of one of the country’s two entities, the Federation or the Republika Srpska. Until now, the latter enclave has held tightly to its control over the 23 bases on its territory — part of a broader dispute with the federal state. It won’t be easy to convince Republika Srpska to give up its turf, but the lure of NATO ties will go a long way.  (photo: Elvis Barukcic/AFP/Getty)

Image: afp%204%2030%2010b.jpg