One of the major recommendations of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe regarding education in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BaH) was "to continue to press for acceptance of a moratorium on teaching about
the most recent conflict so as to enable historians from all the communities in
BaH, with the help of international experts, to develop a
common approach". Seventeen years after the recommendation was adopted, a relevant progress in terms of teaching about the 1992-95 war has not been made.
Interestingly, when the Parliamentary Assembly debated a proposal by Mr Westendorp, High Representative and the Council of Europe - for a fixed-term moratorium on the teaching of recent history in April 1999, the Bosniac member of the BaH Presidency, Mr Izetbegovic, opposed it as an attack on
the truth.
Doc. 8663
14 March 2000
Education in Bosnia and Herzegovina
Report
Committee on Culture and Education
Rapporteur: Mr Lluís Maria de Puig, Spain, Socialist Group
Summary
Education is a critical factor both in establishing
democratic stability in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in bringing about the
return of refugees and displaced persons. The present situation - of
ethnic segregation of children, of offensive stereotyping in school
textbooks and of lack of co-ordination between the competent authorities
- is incompatible with the principles of the Council of Europe.
The Assembly recognises the decisive role the Council
of Europe has been playing in co-operation in this field in Bosnia and
Herzegovina and makes recommendations to bring education up to European
standards. It is essential to re-interpret the Dayton Agreements in
order to achieve a more workable distribution of responsibilities at the
level of the canton, the entities and the state.
I. Draft recommendation
1. The Assembly considers education in Bosnia
and Herzegovina to be one of the most critical factors both for
establishing democratic stability in the country and for bringing about
the return of refugees and displaced persons.
2. It has taken particular note of problems
relating to the ethnic segregation of children, language issues, ethnic
stereotyping in school textbooks and the authorities’ refusal to develop
a common curriculum or to co-ordinate the different curricula.
3. These problems are incompatible with the
principles of the Council of Europe and unworthy of a state signatory to
the European Cultural Convention.
4. The Assembly would point out the good
co-operation in the field between the Council of Europe, the Office of
the High Representative, Unesco, the World Bank and the European Union.
5. It is pleased to note that progress has been
made in the education sector, in particular through the agreement of
the three ministers to remove offensive terms from school textbooks and
to set up a conference of education ministers. It welcomes the leading
role played by the Council of Europe in both developments.
6. It regrets that, despite these modest
examples of progress, education in Bosnia and Herzegovina remains far
behind the corresponding European standards.
7. Accordingly, the Assembly recommends that the Committee of Ministers:
i. provide the means for the Council of Europe to
maintain its decisive role in co-operation in the field of education in
Bosnia and Herzegovina;
ii. work with the High Representative and the other
international organisations present in Bosnia and Herzegovina towards a
re-interpretation of the Dayton Agreements in such a way as to achieve a
more workable distribution of responsibilities at the level of the
cantons, the entities and the state;
iii. co-ordinate its work with that of other
international organisations in order to establish a close link between
financial support from the international community and the authorities’
compliance with prior conditions, especially regarding the content of
school textbooks, segregation, co-ordination and language policies;
iv. continue to press for acceptance of a moratorium
on teaching about the most recent conflict so as to enable historians
from all the communities in Bosnia and Herzegovina, with the help of
international experts, to develop a common approach;
v. ensure that local educational initiatives — in
particular those designed to counteract segregationist thinking —
continue to be encouraged and developed with the aid of moral and
material support, so that what have been isolated projects become the
rule rather than the exception;
vi. give consideration, on the basis of pilot
projects, to setting up multi-ethnic schools in places where they will
have the broadest impact, such as the towns of Brcko and Mostar;
vii. ensure that, in addition to the three
constituent communities, all minorities present on the territory of
Bosnia and Herzegovina are also fully able to exercise their rights to
education in a multi-ethnic perspective;
viii. propose administrative, financial and
legislative solutions designed to lay the foundations for a
cost-effective higher education system which will meet current and
future needs;
ix. consider using distance learning to overcome ethnic segregation at university level.
II. Explanatory memorandum by Mr de Puig
1. Introduction
Since the Assembly debate in April 1999 on Bosnia and
Herzegovina, to which the Committee on Culture and Education
contributed by presenting a report on education (Doc. 8385 — rapporteur
Mr Kollwelter), the committee has continued to monitor closely the
development of education in the country.
Bosnia and Herzegovina became party to the European
Cultural Convention in 1994. As such, it participates as of right in
co-operation within the Council of Europe in the fields of culture,
education, heritage, youth and sport.
As my predecessor last year, I should recall that
Bosnia and Herzegovina applied for Council of Europe membership in April
1995, that the Committee of Ministers decided in January 1999 to
request an opinion from the Parliamentary Assembly on this application
and that responsibility for issuing the opinion lies with the Committees
on Political Affairs and on Legal Affairs.
None the less, education is considered to be one of
the most critical factors both in establishing democratic stability in
Bosnia and Herzegovina and in bringing about the return of displaced
persons. The Council of Europe's attention has repeatedly been drawn to
the importance of the education system in ensuring the transition to
democracy. Problems such as the ethnic segregation of children, language
issues, ethnic stereotyping in school textbooks and the difficulties of
developing a common curriculum have often been raised. As these issues
are inseparable from the process of Bosnian accession, the Committee on
Culture and Education has taken the decision to propose that the
Assembly hold a debate on education before considering — as it will do
later — the question of Bosnian membership of the Council of Europe.
In order to prepare this report, I visited Bosnia and
Herzegovina from 8 to 10 February 2000 in the company of Mr João Ary,
Secretary of the Committee on Culture and Education. I met officials
from the different education ministries (Serb, Croat and Bosniac), heads
of educational establishments, university rectors, teachers, student
representatives and members of international organisations and NGOs (see
attached programme).
2. The political situation
Under the Dayton Agreements of November 1995, the
state of Bosnia and Herzegovina is composed of two entities, the
Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (established under the March 1994
Washington Agreements) and the Republika Srpska (created in January
1993). The Federation comprises ten cantons, of which five have a large
Bosniac majority, three a large Croat majority and two a significant
Croat minority. The border between the two entities corresponds to the
line separating the Bosniacs and Croats on one side from the Serbs on
the other. This separation is a consequence of the war and does not
reflect the previous demographic situation (see attached maps).
The Dayton Agreements provide for the
return of displaced persons to their places of origin. Notwithstanding,
more than four years later ethnic segregation remains unchanged and the
vast majority of those displaced have failed to return. It seems
obvious to me that no one should wish to settle in a hostile environment
offering no guarantees of employment and where, moreover, children
would have to switch to a new education system.
Bosnia and Herzegovina operates on two
levels. On the one hand there are the international organisations, with
SFOR, the United Nations stabilisation force, responsible for all
military matters and the Office of the High Representative responsible
for everything else. On the other hand there are the national
authorities, with three armies (Bosniac, Serb and Croat) and government
institutions at the level of the state, the entities and the cantons.
Under the Washington and Dayton Agreements, nearly all powers (and
control of resources) in the Republika Srpska are exercised by the
entity; in the Federation they are exercised at cantonal level.
However, the cantons with a Croat majority
have effectively grouped themselves together under the “Croat Community
of Herzeg-Bosna”, which claims to protect the interests of all Croats in
Bosnia and Herzegovina. The country is thus divided into three
“communities”, each of which is represented by a nationalist political
party — the Bosniac SDA, the Serb SDS and the Croat HDZ. Characterised
by a lack of clear ideology (apart from that of nationalism) and next to
no political programme, these parties manage to maintain power by
proclaiming themselves to their respective communities as the only force
capable of offering protection against the other two ethnic groups.
In parallel with these three parties,
political groupings a little closer to our European parties are
beginning to emerge, along with a nascent local civil society alongside
the international organisations and NGOs of every description. It is
generally agreed, however, that none of these parties have any hope in
the forthcoming local or national elections (due respectively in April
and October 2000). Another point of agreement is that the situation
cannot change as long as those who led the country into war remain in
power.
The state institutions set up under the
Dayton Agreements have never been able to operate because they are
openly boycotted by the three communities (especially the Serb and the
Croat) and by the entities — which are supposed to provide funding.
Four years after Dayton, therefore, the state parliament has still not
managed to adopt a "permanent law" on election or a law on
privatisation, both of which, however, regarded as essential.
In the light of the recent changes in Croatia
(including the election of a new president) and in view above all of
statements made by the country's new leaders concerning their relations
with the Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina, a fresh approach to
co-operation would appear to be possible, at least within the
Federation. We sensed very clearly from our meetings with Croats that
they feel threatened by the new situation. At every turn they accuse
the international community of supporting the SDA and of wanting to
install an Islamic republic in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
It is increasingly openly acknowledged that
the current Bosnian Constitution, as annexed to the Dayton Agreements,
is in practice an obstacle to the country’s proper functioning.
However, since no revision of the Agreements is to be expected, the
probable solution would be to re-interpret them in such a way as to
achieve a more functional distribution of responsibilities at the level
of the cantons, the entities and the state. All representatives of the
international community on the spot and several local officials (chiefly
Bosniacs) expressed agreement with this step, but there is fierce
opposition from the Serb and Croat nationalist parties.
3. The development of education in Bosnia and Herzegovina
In the former Socialist Federal Republic
of Yugoslavia, education was the responsibility of each of the republics
and co-ordination at federal level was primarily concerned with
ideology. However, in terms of general structure and of curriculum
content and form, between 1945 and 1990 the education system in the
Socialist Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina was not substantially different
from that in the other republics of the former Yugoslavia. There was a
single education system for all inhabitants, whether Serb, Croat or
Bosniac, and the language of instruction was Serbo-Croat. Both the
Cyrillic and the Latin alphabets were taught, though the former was in
decline.
The 1992-95 war opposing the paramilitary forces
of the Bosnian Serbs (greatly assisted by the federal Yugoslav army),
the army of Bosnia-Herzegovina and the Croatian-supported Croat Defence
Council (HVO) completely dismantled the education system. No financial
support was available, many schools were damaged or destroyed, others
were used to shelter displaced persons or requisitioned by the military,
thousands of school books and complete libraries were set on fire,
populations were displaced and many teachers and pupils were killed, so
that by mid-1992 it was already no longer possible to speak of an
education system in the country.
The country's division along ethnic lines
has been accompanied by a process of linguistic separation. Whereas
before the war all inhabitants of the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina
spoke a form of Serbo-Croat, Croats now claim to speak the “Croat
language”, Serbs the “Serb language” and Bosniacs the “Bosniac
language”. Although the last named has remained very close to the
language spoken in the country before the war, a number of words
invented or rediscovered by linguists in Zagreb have been introduced
into the “Croat language” (it would be interesting to monitor this
phenomenon in the light of the recent political changes in Croatia).
Despite the apparent complexity of these linguistic developments, mutual
comprehension between the three versions presents no difficulties.
Since 1992, then, three systems have gradually become established on the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina:
—in the Serb-controlled area,
corresponding to the present-day Republika Srpska, the system is
imported from Serbia and uses textbooks from Belgrade, the Cyrillic
alphabet and the “Serb language”;—
—in the area controlled by HVO forces,
which now corresponds to the three Croat-majority cantons and parts of
two other cantons, and in the Catholic schools which have sprung up
wherever Croats live, the Croatian system has been imported, using
school books from Zagreb, the Latin alphabet and the “Croat language”;—
—th e Bosniac system, which uses the
“Bosniac language”, was developed in Sarajevo with schoolbooks produced
under difficult circumstances during the siege of that city.4.
4. Current situation
a. General background
Language and, more generally, education policies have
become a vehicle for promoting “national” separation. The political
struggle within education manifests itself both in the context of
“national subjects” — history, language and literature and social
studies — and in the desire for political control of the three separate
education systems. In practice, this is reflected by history textbooks
which cause offence to the other two “nationalities” and by parallel
administration at all levels of the education system in the Federation.
The formal divide between the Federation and the Republika Srpska may
be interpreted as another form of “parallelism”, although in this
instance there is a constitutional basis for the existence of two
systems. The political division of education in Bosnia and Herzegovina
is well established in the Federation, where Croat political
authorities, who feel isolated by their smaller numbers and by the
attention given to the Bosniac-dominated institutions in Sarajevo,
refuse to co-operate with their Federation partners even on mathematics
and science curricula.
This is the reality of Bosnia and Herzegovina today, and no significant changes should be expected in the short term.
b. The consequences of Dayton for education
By the signature of the Dayton Agreements, Bosnia and
Herzegovina was declared an independent state composed of two entities,
the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Republika Srpska.
Under the Agreements, the national government retains only such powers
as will enable it to act as the government of an internationally
recognised state. The majority of governmental powers — including
responsibility for education, science and culture — are vested in the
two entities. In the Federation, competence for education is devolved
to the ten constituent cantons. The legislation of certain cantons
provides that this authority can be further devolved to the municipal
level. There are no sub-units in the Republika Srpska, where
educational competence is centralised at the level of the entity and
exercised by a single ministry of education.
Each canton in the Federation therefore has the right
to organise and manage its own education system, including higher
education, although some cantons do not have higher education
institutions. Education is generally funded through income tax and
other revenues.
Because each canton can set standards, devise
legislation and regulations and choose or develop its own curriculum and
textbooks, political divisions and tensions that emerged during the war
have been reinforced and, in some cases, intensified. Currently,
nationalist policies are expressed through control of curricula,
textbooks and access to education. In the context of the cantons,
educational decision-making contributes to further division and
fragmentation and becomes a vehicle for nationalist political groups to
pursue their separatist agendas.
As a direct consequence of Dayton, the education
sector is dominated by politics. Major educational decisions are made
almost exclusively in the context of continuing political tensions
between national groups. This has resulted in two parallel systems in
the Federation and a third in the Republika Srpska. The problem is
particularly acute within the Federation Ministry and in the cantons
with a large Croat minority, where parallel administrative institutions
have emerged to provide education for their respective ethnic groups.
Recruitment within the divided ministries must respect the requirement
for an ethnic balance. As this balance carries with it the political
agendas that split the Federation, the minister and the deputy minister
cater to their political constituencies through two separate teams of
different ethnic origins.
Another consequence of “Daytonisation” has been the
complete marginalisation of other ethnic groups, chiefly Roma and Jews,
who were not taken into account among the peoples making up Bosnia and
Herzegovina and who, to exist legally, must choose between being
Bosniac, Serb or Croat. Since no educational provision has been made
for them either, here too they have to choose between the three
education systems.
c. Ethnic segregation
On each occasion that I raised this issue during our
meetings with local officials, I was assured that discrimination did not
exist in the schools of their respective systems. While it is true
that no law or regulation specifies that children shall be discriminated
against on ethnic grounds (as formerly in South Africa and the USA), de facto discrimination does nonetheless exist in the country’s three education systems.
We were informed by Mr Dragosavljevic, the Republika
Srpska Deputy Minister for Education, that each school with at least 25
non-Serb pupils could request instruction in their mother tongue and
following their own curriculum. We later learned that this is not true
of a single school in the Republika Srpska. On the contrary, Bosniac
and Croat children are obliged to follow the Serb curriculum.
The same situation obtains in the Federation. For
example, at the beginning of the current academic year the media
reported that some 300 children of Bosniac refugees had been unable to
attend school in Zepce municipality, where the Croat curriculum is used,
and that some 250 Croat refugee children had faced difficulties in
Bugojno, which has a Bosniac majority. Similar problems have been
reported in Stolac, Capljina and Vares.
Religion too is used as an instrument for
segregation. We heard that the majority of schools in the Republika
Srpska are decorated with Orthodox motifs and that for the pupils of one
Sarajevo school, including both Bosniac and non-Bosniac children,
Ramadan had been the focus of the entire first term of the current
academic year.
d. Textbooks
Together with the Office of the High Representative,
Unesco, other international organisations and NGOs, the Council of
Europe has worked within the Sarajevo Return Commission and the steering
group for education in Sarajevo on the task of identifying ethnic
stereotyping and potentially offensive material in school textbooks. In
his report last year Mr Kollwelter described how this activity had been
sabotaged.
Having stalled for nearly a year, in August 1999 the
three education ministers bowed to international pressure and finally
signed an agreement under which terms and sections which could be
considered offensive would be removed from textbooks or marked as
debatable. Instructions were circulated to the effect that schools were
to remove such terms before the start of the academic year.
When the school year began, the Office of the High
Representative and other international organisations undertook a major
exercise to monitor compliance with these instructions. Despite some
major reservations concerning certain schools and municipalities, it was
ascertained that considerable progress had been made on the first stage
of implementation. Generally speaking, compliance was greater in the
Federation than in the Republika Srpska.
It should be pointed out that this is just the first
step in a long process. The second stage, which will consist of
indicating which topics and passages contain information the accuracy of
which has not been checked, has yet to get under way.
e. School curricula
The issue of developing and reforming school
curricula in the whole country is a major priority. At present each
national group within Bosnia and Herzegovina makes use of an ethnic
syllabus which it has itself developed, and there is practically no
co-ordination or co-operation (in spite of which we were told that the
three curricula are 95% identical). However, because results are not
recognised throughout the country, it is difficult for children to
change schools, and problems also exist in connection with the return of
refugees and access to higher education.
In August 1999 Unesco published a report on “national
subject” curricula. This was followed by a seminar on curriculum
reform, which Unesco organised in Sarajevo in February 2000. According
to the report, unacceptable elements of the Bosniac curriculum concern
practical military training for pupils and a view of history in which
Bosniacs are systematically represented as past and present victims of
aggression, genocide and ethnic cleansing. Unacceptable aspects of the
Croat curriculum are its close identification with the Republic of
Croatia and a tendency to ignore the other nationalities in Bosnia and
Herzegovina. Offensive and unacceptable elements of the Serb curriculum
again concern practical military training, the fact that the “region of
reference” is Serbia and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and that no
account is taken of the country’s other two nationalities.
Serbs and Croats gave a hostile reception to the
report and to all reference to the possibility either of a partially
shared curriculum or of co-ordination between the three curricula.
Addressing the Unesco seminar, the Serb minister said that the very idea
of a common curriculum was a direct attack on the Dayton Agreements and
peace plan. Both the Serb minister’s representative and that of his
Croat counterpart considered references to “Bosnian Serbs/Croats” an
insult.
For this reason, political discussion of model
curricula has so far prevented practical consideration (which is far
more necessary) of their content.
f. Language issues
Some representatives of the education authorities in
Bosnia and Herzegovina consider that the new linguistic situation —with
three “languages” — calls for distinct education systems, on the grounds
that the various needs cannot be reconciled within a single system.
The production of new textbooks for Bosnia and Herzegovina, which is
essential for the country's development, therefore raises a number of
serious problems, since arguments based on linguistic rights are used to
justify segregation in schools and the drawing up of distinct
syllabuses for each ethnic group. Accepting linguistically distinct
versions of textbooks, as the representatives of the different education
authorities demand, would thus be a further step down the path towards
accepting the segregation of children according to language and ethnic
background.
The political stakes of the language
issue for the public authorities should not be underestimated, since the
outcome could determine the viability of Bosnia and Herzegovina as a
coherent state. So far there has been no independent assessment of the
country's linguistic development, and in the current political climate
it is unlikely that the national authorities will request such an
exercise.
g. History teaching
A number of critical issues have emerged concerning
history teaching. Their potential impact on Bosnian society is
enormous. The most acute problems relate to the recent conflict (aggression to Bosniacs, civil war to the Serbs and war of liberation
to the Croats), but all teaching of Balkan history raises difficulties.
The most delicate areas concern competing versions of the “truth” and
the blame for historical events, with the obvious danger that history
teaching will be used as a tool of nationalist propaganda.
Certain proposals have been drawn up to deal with
these problems. Mr Kollwelter’s report refers to a Council of Europe
and High Representative proposal for a fixed-term moratorium on the
teaching of recent history to enable local historians from all ethnic
groups to work with international historians on a version (or versions)
of recent events which everyone accepts and which can be used in
schools.
When the Parliamentary Assembly debated
Bosnia and Herzegovina in April 1999, the Bosniac member of the joint
presidency, Mr Izetbegovic, opposed such a moratorium as an attack on
the truth. However, as Mr Westendorp so pertinently pointed out at the
end of the debate, in the case of a conflict such as that in Bosnia and
Herzegovina truth is always the first victim. The response to the
moratorium by other politicians in the country has been negative in the
extreme. The recommendation is seen as a call for “lies and silence”.
In spite of these negative reactions, it is
my view that the Council of Europe must continue to press for acceptance
of the moratorium.
The Council of Europe has stressed the
importance of supporting approaches to history which take account of
diverse points of view and encourage the development of critical and
analytical thinking as advocated in Recommendation 1283 (1996) on
history and the learning of history in Europe. In November 1999 a
seminar on the teaching of controversial and sensitive issues was
jointly organised in Sarajevo with the Office of the High
Representative. The seminar was attended by writers of history
textbooks, teachers and teacher trainers from all over the country. Its
conclusions pave the way for an integrated teaching process which will
start in 2000 within the framework of the Stability Pact. The Council
of Europe should focus its activity in particular on the development of
history syllabuses and integrated training for teachers from all the
ethnic communities.
h. Higher education
As regards higher education, it would seem that what
appears to be three different systems is really a single one — the old,
very cumbersome and obsolete central European system — approached from
three separate nationalist viewpoints. Universities and departments are
currently springing up everywhere. Their autonomous status adds to the
waste of resources and problems of co-ordination. The student
representatives whom we met complained about the poor standard of
teachers, who merely reproduced what they themselves had learned some
decades previously. In general, the students lack motivation, and it is
proving difficult to persuade them to take part in reforming their
instituions.
The Council of Europe should focus its activity in
this sector on ways of developing the system and ensuring its overall
co-ordination so that all citizens can enjoy equal access to higher
education. The fact that the system is so highly decentralised raises
particularly serious problems, and issues of funding, quality, the
recognition of qualifications, breaks in studying and internal mobility
should continue to be given high priority.
To help resolve these problems, the Council of Europe
has lent support to the creation of a National Higher Education
Council. That such a body is needed to lay down policy guidelines and
provide co-ordination has been recognised both within the country and by
all the international organisations active in the education sector in
Bosnia and Herzegovina. The World Bank has made the existence of the
Higher Education Council a pre-condition for investment in the sector,
and it is hoped that the remaining obstacles will be overcome in the
months ahead. The three education ministers have agreed to the setting
up of this Council. It remains to be seen how it will operate in
practice.
5. Conclusions
The main challenges facing the country —
smoothing the return of displaced persons and guaranteeing democratic
stability — are closely dependent on positive changes in the education
system. The country's ethnic segregation calls for urgent attention,
since the “ghettoisation” of pupils according to their linguistic and/or
ethnic backgrounds would cast doubt on its long-term viability as a
multi-ethnic state.
There is an urgent need for co-ordination at
cantonal level — and between the Federation and the Republika Srpska —
in order to safeguard every community’s rights to education. Grades and
exam results must be standardised and recognised not only in a canton
but everywhere in the country, so that pupils face no obstacles on
moving to schools in other cantons, entities or countries. In addition
to the question of official recognition, curricula and examinations must
be acknowledged as being essentially the same in every part of the
country. If the current situation continues, fears about their
children’s education may prevent displaced persons from taking the
difficult decision to return to their places of origin. The problems of
access to higher education will become acute too if there is no
improvement in co-operation between cantons.
Achieving the transition to a more integrated
education system — or at least the more effective co-ordination of
parallel systems — is an immensely difficult task which necessitates
complex planning in stages and the restoration of confidence between the
different communities. In the present post-war context, where most of
the country's regions continue to be divided along ethnic lines, few
issues can have a higher priority.
Since last year, in addition to progress on the
textbooks question, one other recommendation formulated by Mr Kollwelter
has been followed up — namely, the establishment of a formal conference
of education ministers to settle matters of common interest. Following
a proposal by the Council of Europe, what was an informal meeting of
the ministers has become a “standing conference”. Although the
conference’s functions have not yet been clearly defined, the very fact
that it is able to take decisions must be seen as a positive move. The
Conference of Education Ministers is a good example of a
re-interpretation of the Dayton Agreements, as proposed in the draft
recommendation.
FACT FINDING MISSION TO BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA
Mr. Lluis Maria de Puig, Rapporteur on education
to the Committee on Culture and Education
of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe
7 – 10 February 2000
Monday 7 February 2000
16.00 Unesco symposium on the curricula of the "national" subjects in Bosnia and Herzegovina
Tuesday 8 February 2000
0 9.00 Unesco symposium on the curricula of the "national" subjects in Bosnia and Herzegovina
16:00 Meeting with Mr Jurkic, Deputy Federal Minister of Education
16.30 Meeting with Mr Proko Dragosavljevic, Deputy Minister of Education, Republika Srpska
17.15 Meeting with Ambassador Hoffman, Deputy High Representative
18:00 Meeting with Mr Rizvanbegovic, Federal Minister of Education
20:00 Dinner with Mrs Ilona Szenso, World Bank
Wednesday 9 February 2000
09:00 Meeting with students (Serdarevic, Student Union, Kulenovic, Youth Club "Say Yes", etc)
10:00 Meeting with Mrs Svjetlana Broz and Mrs Sabiha Miskin, teachers
15:00 Meeting with Mr Halilovic, Minister of Education, Canton Sarajevo
15: 45 Meeting with Mrs Hadzagic, Minister for Culture and Sport, Canton Sarajevo
17:30 Meeting at UN, Ambassador Jacques-Paul Klein and Mr Kishore Mandhyan
20.00 Dinner with Mr Benedek, WUS Austria, and Council of Europe team on minority languages
Thursday 10 February 2000
09:00 Meeting with Mr Mulabegovic, Rector of Sarajevo University
10.00 Meeting with the International Human Rights Law Group (Ms Idzakovic)
11.00 Meeting with Mr Claude Kieffer, Senior Education Officer, OHR
