"Russia has used Bosnian territory to train Moldovan citizens in organizing protests and street demonstrations," said the Foreign Minister of Bosnia and Herzegovina Elmedin Konaković, who noted that his country needs external support to counter "Russia's negative impact in the heart of Europe," RFE/RL’s Moldovan Service reported, being quoted by IPN.
Elmedin Konaković told journalists that he had "no concrete evidence" that the training was also "military in nature", but "training related to the organization of protests or street demonstrations" definitely took place.
The Bosnian minister's statement comes shortly after the U.S. Embassy in Sarajevo told the Bosnian editorial office of Radio Free Europe that the Bosnian authorities must "thoroughly investigate" the existence of a training camp, reported by the Moldovan authorities, where the Russian private military groups Wagner and Ferma allegedly trained Moldovans to destabilize the Republic of Moldova.
"There is evidence, which I personally saw, that such groups had been active in Bosnia and Herzegovina, confirming once again Russia's negative impact in the heart of Europe, against which Bosnia and Herzegovina cannot defend itself," Konaković said, according to the Service.
The Moldovan authorities on October 17 said that more than 100 young people were trained in Russia to organize post-election protests in Chisinau, and the best were later sent to additional training in the Balkans, including for making explosives, in an operation supported by fugitive oligarch Ilan Shor.
In Bosnia and Herzegovina, a country still partially under international administration after the Bosnian war of the start of the 1990s, the Moldovan accusations have once again highlighted internal divisions. The federal government in Sarajevo pleads for the country's integration into the EU, while the Republika Srpska, part of the federation, wants closer relations with Moscow and periodically threatens with secession.
The pro-Russian Minister of Security Nenad Nešić initially told Radio Free Europe and later repeated that the statements coming from Chisinau about the Russian training camp are groundless and are electoral in character, being aimed at harming Russia and its allies. On the other hand, members of a parliamentary commission in Sarajevo, which oversees the Intelligence-Security Agency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, told Radio Free Europe that they were informed by the agency that the Russian camp was based on the territory of the Republika Srpska.
The ties between Chisinau and Sarajevo were strengthened this autumn, when 19 Moldovan soldiers went to Bosnia and Herzegovina to participate in the EU peacekeeping operation Eufor Althea.
Moldova pledged to contribute to the operation in Bosnia at an EU conference on April 18 in Brussels, which centered on European military missions. Currently, the Eufor Althea operation involves soldiers from 22 countries.
