Bosnian Serb leader Dodik's journey from Western darling to pro-Russian separatist

SARAJEVO (Reuters) - When a court sentenced Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik to jail last month for defying the order of an international peace envoy, Moscow rushed to his defence, publicly calling the move "unacceptable" and "politically motivated".

Buoyed by the support, Dodik barred the state's authorities from the Serb region of Bosnia. 

On Thursday, a Bosnian court said it had issued an international arrest warrant for Dodik, who is accused of attacking the constitutional order and has gone abroad in defiance of an earlier internal arrest warrant.

He had crossed into neighbouring Serbia earlier this week then travelled to Israel for an antisemitism conference in Jerusalem.

In nearly three decades in top government jobs in Bosnia's autonomous Serb Republic, Dodik, 66, has shaped the national political agenda and - according to his critics - deepened ethnic divides between Christian Serbs and Croats and Muslim Bosniaks.

In a speech to the region's parliament on March 13, he dared state police to come and detain him - a move that many fear would lead to clashes with the local, loyalist forces. 

"Come on, try and arrest us," he shouted.

The statement marked a new low point in relations between Bosnia's autonomous Serb Republic and state authorities and raised fears that the Balkan country might slip back into the kind of ethnic tensions that led to war in the 1990s. 

Amid the tension, the EU added hundreds of troops to its EUFOR peace force, deployed in Bosnia in 2004 to replace thousands of NATO troops.

It also highlighted the complete turnaround for Dodik, from a moderate backed by the West to replace wartime nationalists to a pro-Russian separatist threatening the entire integrity of the Bosnian state.    

EARLY REFORMER 

A burly basketball fan, Dodik was the first Serb politician to recognise the massacre of about 8,000 Bosnian Muslims in Srebrenica during the 1992-1995 Bosnian war as genocide. 

Early in his career, which began in a pro-reform movement just before the collapse of former Yugoslavia, the Belgrade University graduate condemned war criminals and was in opposition to ruling Serb nationalists in their wartime parliament.

Initially, Dodik was a "fresh breeze" in Bosnian politics, someone who understood the influence of international players and courted them, said Sead Turcalo, a political science lecturer at Sarajevo University.

After the U.S.-sponsored Dayton peace accords ended the war, the West was looking for a new Serb leader as an alternative to the nationalists, many of whom were indicted for war crimes. Dodik appeared to fit the bill. 

With Western backing in 1998 he became the prime minister of the Serb Republic, which makes up postwar Bosnia along with the Bosniak-Croat Federation, even though his party had only two seats in the regional parliament.

But after a lost election in 2001, Dodik began embracing nationalist rhetoric dear to Serbs. He returned to power in 2006.

DRAMATIC CHANGE

His stance on the war changed dramatically. He denied the Srebrenica genocide ever took place and played down Serbian war crimes in Bosnia, welcoming those convicted for them and later released from jail as heroes. In 2016, Dodik opened a student dormitory named after Radovan Karadzic, the first Serb leader who was jailed for life for genocide and war crimes.

"Over the years, as it suited him politically... he transformed into an ultra-nationalist and separatist," Turcalo said.

In all, Dodik has served three terms as the region's prime minister and three terms as its president. In that time, his politics became increasingly nationalistic and pro-Russian. For 10 years, he has called for secession from Bosnia and unification with Serbia. 

He was twice officially accused of abuse of office and even indicted for money laundering with a group of close allies, but the charges were dropped due to lack of evidence.

The United States has imposed a series of sanctions against him for violating the terms of the peace deal and corruption, which he denies. He was also sanctioned by Britain for undermining the peace and stability in Bosnia.

ARMED CONFRONTATION?

Dodik responded to the jail sentence handed to him in February by ordering the adoption of laws that bar the state judiciary and police from operating in the Serb region. Bosnia's constitutional court suspended the legislation and called it an attack on the constitutional order. 

Dodik and two of his close aides then ignored a summons by state prosecutors investigating an alleged undermining of the constitution. As a result, the state court issued a warrant for his arrest and ordered police agencies to apprehend them.

Security experts say that Dodik's arrest must be carefully planned to avoid armed confrontation with the Serb Republic police, which have pledged to protect him and his aides. 

How it plays out for Dodik now is unclear. He hopes that U.S. President Donald Trump will be more sympathetic to his separatism. But support among ordinary Serbs appears to be dwindling, with almost none heeding his calls to leave their jobs in state institutions.

(Reporting by Daria Sito-Sucic; Editing by Edward McAllister and Alex Richardson)