The Trump administration has lifted sanctions on a kleptocratic ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, who was eliminated this month as president of the Serb territory inside Bosnia and Herzegovina for chipping away on the US-brokered peace deal that ended bloody ethnic violence within the Balkans within the Nineteen Nineties.
The waiving of sanctions on Milorad Dodik adopted a months-long lobbying effort by allies of Donald Trump, which painted the Serb nationalist chief as a defender of “Christian values” in a rustic with a big Muslim inhabitants, and a sufferer of the type of “lawfare” waged towards the US president.
Dodik had been sanctioned by the US for flouting the Dayton Peace Agreement, which was painstakingly thrashed out in Ohio in 1995 to finish the Bosnian War. While the settlement stopped the bloodshed, it carved Bosnia into two entities: the Federation, the place Bosnian Muslims share energy with Croats, and the Serb-majority Republika Srpska.
Over 20 years in and round energy in Srpska, Dodik routinely threatened to separate from Bosnia and “reunite” with Serbia. He has halted Bosnia’s integration into Europe by stoking ethnic tensions, usually meets with Putin in Russia and has cultivated what the US Treasury Department beforehand referred to as a “corrupt patronage network.”
Bosnians had not too long ago begun to think about a post-Dodik future, after the longtime chief was convicted by a federal Bosnian courtroom of undermining the Dayton settlement, banned from holding political workplace and stripped of his put up as president. But consultants say that the sudden and surprising removing of sanctions towards Dodik might enable him to proceed to dominate Srpska, whereas demonstrating to different autocrats within the area that well-funded lobbying can reap rewards from Trump’s Washington.
“What sort of message does this send – that if you have the right connections and the right lobbyists, you can be removed from the sanctions list? It’s setting a negative precedent,” Andi Hoxhaj, a Balkan professional at King’s College London, informed NCS. Coming three weeks earlier than Dayton’s thirtieth anniversary, he mentioned the timing of the Trump administration’s determination was particularly dispiriting.
The US Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) didn’t clarify why it had eliminated sanctions on Dodik, in addition to dozens of his allies, his relations and corporations linked to them. NCS has requested the Treasury Department for remark.
The State Department mentioned the choice was taken after Srpska’s National Assembly took “constructive actions” in current weeks to “improve stability” within the nation, in obvious reference to Srpska’s set up of an interim president after Dodik was stripped of the function in August and – after initially threatening to defy Bosnian authorities – stepped apart earlier this month.
Dodik hailed Trump and his allies for waiving the sanctions towards him, saying the choice corrected “a grave injustice” inflicted upon Srpska “by the Obama and Biden administrations.” What Dodik failed to say, nonetheless, is that he was additionally sanctioned by the Trump administration in July 2017 for obstructing the Dayton settlement. The Biden administration imposed contemporary sanctions on him in 2022 and once more in early 2025.
Dodik started to courtroom Trump earlier than the 2024 election, when the president was going through dozens of legal costs. “America needs you, but the rest of the world as well!” Dodik wrote to Trump in September that 12 months, following the second assassination try towards him.
Since Trump’s return to the White House, Dodik’s overtures have been amplified by a number of allies of the president. Rod Blagojevich – the previous Illinois governor who spent eight years in jail on corruption costs earlier than being pardoned by Trump in February – has posted in help of Dodik for months.
In a put up on Wednesday thanking Trump for waiving the sanctions on Dodik, Blagojevich signed off: “This material is distributed by RRB Strategies LLC on behalf of the Republic of Srpska. Additional information is available at the Department of Justice, Washington, DC.”
Filings to the Justice Department present RRB Strategies, Blagojevich’s agency, signed a contract with the Srpska authorities in March, agreeing to “lobby state representatives to prevent what is perceived as a witch hunt against Srpska officials” and “seek the lifting of sanctions” towards them. The worth of that contract was redacted.
Marc Zell, one other lobbyist, additionally signed a contract with the Srpska authorities in December 2024 value $1 million for one 12 months’s work, plus a bonus if Zell’s agency efficiently introduced in regards to the removing of sanctions on Dodik and his allies, in line with paperwork additionally filed with the Justice Department’s Foreign Agents Registration Act web site. In an e-mail, Zell informed NCS that the bonus price provision was canceled in accordance with US regulation.
This month, distinguished MAGA figures joined the refrain of Trump allies championing Dodik’s trigger. Laura Loomer, the far-right influencer with a direct line to the president, said Dodik’s removing as president of Srpska was “the latest example of the brazen assault against Trump-like leaders across the world.” She claimed Dodik – a “Christian” chief – was “enduring ruthless political attacks from a coalition of Muslims and globalists.”
Michael Flynn, Trump’s former nationwide safety adviser, called for Trump to “embrace” Dodik, and for the US to hitch forces with Srpska to defeat globalists “who seek all of our demise.”
Rudy Giuliani, the previous mayor of New York City and Trump’s one-time private lawyer, visited Srpska in February and hosted Dodik on his podcast, displaying “Make Srpska Great Again” hats alongside Trump’s well-known MAGA hats.
Hoxhaj, the Balkan professional, mentioned Dodik will use the sanctions aid to say “to his people and to the public that he has been vindicated by the US, and that what was done to him was unjust.”
US Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, the top-ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, denounced the lifting of sanctions as “reckless and premature.”
“Dodik has undermined the Dayton Peace Agreement, cozied up to Putin and profited from corruption – hardly grounds for relief,” she mentioned. “The American people deserve answers.”