The Landi manifesto promises not to overturn decrees of previous high representatives, to consult the PIC before taking substantial actions, and not to unilaterally close the office.
London, France, and Berlin remain unconvinced by the Landi campaign.
As of Monday, they were aligned behind a French candidate, René Troccaz, who serves as France’s Balkans envoy.
Bosnia's Fragile Peace at Stake
This tussle underlines how much Bosnia’s current realities are still defined by the 1992-95 war, which killed 100,000 people.
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Most victims were Muslim Bosniaks slaughtered by better-armed Serb forces, and to a lesser extent, Croats.
The US-brokered Dayton peace deal stopped the bloodshed in late 1995 but enshrined ethnic politics.
It divided the country into a Bosniak-Croat Federation and a Serb-run entity called the Republika Srpska.
The office of the high representative was established to oversee the Dayton agreement and guide Bosnia toward integration.
That mission has largely failed, leaving the country deeply divided, with Republika Srpska under the sway of Serb separatist Milorad Dodik.
Successive European high representatives have been reluctant to invoke their powers, but Schmidt stepped in last year to annul Dodik’s separatist actions.
This intervention led to the Serb leader’s ousting last September.
The hardliner's 28-year grip on power momentarily seemed broken, but the Trump administration later came to Dodik’s rescue.
The US abruptly lifted sanctions imposed by the Biden administration on Dodik and his associates for corruption and divisive rhetoric.
