Lt. Antonio Ruiz González
First published in
SFOR Informer#142, July 4, 2002

The Office of the High Representative (OHR) in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) has a full military department. This is the Military Cell and it is made up of service members from several countries including Austria, Canada, France, Germany, Slovenia, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States.

Sarajevo - The military advisor is UK Royal Navy Rear Admiral Hugh Edleston. "The military cell has three principal tasks. The first one is working for the High Representative in institutions and state building. We have contributed to writing the security policy for BiH and also completed a draft defence policy for BiH with other agencies, including SFOR, Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), United Nations Agencies and others," explained Edleston.
"The second task is assisting with de-mining. At this capacity, the UNDP (United Nations Development Programme) director, Henrik Kolstrup, and myself are co-chairing the Board of Donors (for de-mining). We provide political direction for de-mining in the country. It is a BiH responsibility, but the funding, mainly through the International Trust Fund (ITF), is the responsibility of the International Community," he added.
"The third area we deal with is civilian aviation. This is a mandate of the GFAP (General Framework Agreement for Peace in BiH) as well, to ensure that the country has a fully managed and structured civilian aviation organisation which includes the ability to fly over this country and others," said Edleston.
Security and Defence Policy
A working group manages these two issues. German Army Col. Wolfgang Harms is part of that team: "The whole issue of the development of the BiH defence identity and related structure and mechanism is going back to the PIC (Peace Implementation Council) mandate from May 2000 in Brussels. The OHR is mandated to contribute to the development of this state level defence identity and the mechanism related to this, which means basically to enable the state to take responsibility in defence matters within the international environment," he explained.
"The co-operation between SFOR and the Military Cell is centred in the Common Security Policy Working Group, which is co-chaired by Edleston and the SFOR Deputy Commander for Operations," said Harms.
De-mining
An international trust fund, based in Slovenia, has been established to organise and finance de-mining activities and to provide rehabilitation for the victims of mine incidents. Slovenian Army Maj. Robert Strazisar deals with this matter in the cell.
"One of the most important elements is that Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), for the first time in its history, put the funds for de-mining from its own budget. From this year, they will pay the salary of the BiH MAC (Mine Action Centre)," said Strazisar.
About the collaboration between SFOR and the OHR on this matter, Strazisar remarked that "we have a good co-operation; one of the main goals of SFOR is to monitor the Armed Forces of the Entities in de-mining. We appreciate all efforts SFOR is pushing forward because de-mining is a serious job."
Civil Aviation
The current work of the cell on this subject revolves around the need for BiH to establish effective control of its own airspace. BiH is managing its intermediate air space, but the lower one is controlled by SFOR.
According to Spanish Air Force Col. Antonio de la Cruz, the next step "will be that SFOR hand-over the provision for the Air Traffic Control Services of lower airspace to civilian arranged services by BiH authorities in Sarajevo and Mostar."
For the institution building of the department of civil aviation, "we are aiming for a fully functional and strong organisation capable of planning, implementing, and enforcing all civil aviation matters, with the financing of the International Community," said de la Cruz.

Related links:
Our Partners - OHR