By Mohammad Mohseni - UK & European Affairs Desk

Republika Srpska (RS), one of the three political divisions of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), has had elections before that mattered for the whole region, but the snap RS presidential election on 23 November 2025 was unusually political: it happened because the wider constitutional conflict in BiH had reached a breaking point after Milorad Dodik, a Bosnian Serb politician who served twice as President of RS and once as a member of BiH’s presidency, was removed from office and placed under legal restrictions. The court of BiH banned him from politics for six years over anti-constitutional conduct, after he defied the authority of the High Representative, Christian Schmidt, and introduced laws in RS aimed at nullifying his decisions and barring state-level judicial and security institutions.

Therefore, the RS presidency became the main battlefield for legitimacy. The snap vote was then framed by many actors as a choice between “continuity” and “a reset,” even if the real choice was more limited than that. The result was a narrow victory (50.89%) for Siniša Karan (SNSD), the candidate backed by Dodik’s camp, who pledged to continue Dodik’s policies “with even greater determination.” He added that “as always, when times were difficult, the Serb people have prevailed.” However, opposition alleged irregularities and pushing for repeat voting in some places. Consequently, BiH's Central Election Commission announced that voting will be Repeated in 17 municipalities at 136 polling stations. 

This close and contested outcome matters because it shapes how Serbia and Russia operate in the Western Balkans. Neither Belgrade nor Moscow “controls” RS. But both can gain influence when RS politics becomes more confrontational—especially when BiH institutions are blocked and the international community is forced into crisis management.

What the 2025 snap election really signaled inside RS

Karan’s victory with roughly 50 percent of the vote, while the opposition candidate backed by the SDS and others followed very closely behind, shows that the SNSD machine can be challenged, even if it still controls power at the entity level. The narrow margin reflects growing public dissatisfaction with SNSD’s long rule, widely associated with corruption scandals, institutional capture, and worsening economic conditions in RS. At the same time, it reveals clear vulnerabilities ahead of the 2026 general elections.

Politically, this weak result is costly for Dodik’s camp. Rather than consolidating authority, it exposes the limits of administrative control and patronage-based mobilisation and may incentivise Dodik to compensate through renewed political escalation. For the opposition, however, the outcome provides concrete evidence that SNSD can be challenged even in a structurally unfair political environment. This is likely to encourage stronger opposition cooperation, more professional campaigning, and greater investment in election monitoring.

Serbia: stronger as RS’s anchor, but with tight limits

Serbia’s role in RS is often described as a mix of solidarity, coordination, and careful ambiguity. Belgrade wants to remain the key external partner of RS. After Dodik’s verdict, Vučić first summoned Serbia’s National Security Council and then flew to Banja Luka in a show of support for Dodik, condemning the verdict as shameful and illegal and accusing its authors of seeking to undermine Republika Srpska and the Serb population.

One concrete sign of how institutionalised the Serbia–RS link has become is the joint session and the adoption of the “Declaration on the Protection of National and Political Rights and the Common Future of the Serbian People” in June 2024, reported on Serbia’s official government website. Most recently, during events marking 8 January 2026 in Banja Luka, Serbian Prime Minister Đuro Macut reaffirmed that Serbia will continue to strengthen its “special and parallel ties” with Republika Srpska, highlighting expanded cooperation not only in culture and infrastructure but increasingly in science, healthcare, and education.

While officially framed as cultural and developmental cooperation, the All-Serbian Assembly and the Declaration adopted in June 2024 go beyond symbolic partnership and increasingly blur the line between inter-state cooperation and political integration. By calling on the institutions of Serbia and Republika Srpska to act in a “unified and coordinated manner,” the Assembly constructs a transborder political space that implicitly treats RS not as an entity within Bosnia and Herzegovina, but as part of a broader Serbian political community. 

Russia: more leverage through crisis, not through popularity

Russia appears in the crisis as Milorad Dodik’s principal external political backer and a potential diplomatic shield. Dodik announced that he would seek Moscow’s help after Bosnian state prosecutors ordered his arrest, including asking Russia to veto the extension of the EU peacekeeping mission (EUFOR) at the UN Security Council. Russia has publicly supported Dodik and rejected the Bosnian court’s ruling, which Moscow described as a blow to regional stability. 

Russia labelled the February 2025 verdict against Dodik as fabricated and politically motivated persecution, later condemning his removal as “illegal,” blaming Western neo-colonialism, and calling for the closure of the Office of the High Representative. In doing so, Moscow internationalises the crisis, positions itself directly against the EU and the United States, and introduces a security dimension into what is otherwise a domestic constitutional confrontation.

Regional impact: why the RS election affects the Western Balkans

The snap presidential election exposed a weakening of the SNSD’s long-standing dominance in Republika Srpska. The razor-thin and contested result did not consolidate power but revealed growing public dissatisfaction and the erosion of Dodik’s control-based political model. Rather than stabilising authority, the outcome signals vulnerability ahead of the 2026 Bosnian general election and creates incentives for political escalation as a substitute for declining domestic legitimacy.

As internal legitimacy weakens, external backing becomes more important. Serbia is therefore positioned to play an even stronger role as RS’s political anchor through diplomatic support, institutionalised cooperation, and symbolic alignment. Russia, in turn, operates as a strategic shield, challenging Bosnia’s state institutions and international oversight while internationalising the crisis. Together, these dynamics turn the RS election from a local contest into a regional pressure point, deepening Bosnia’s crisis and reinforcing geopolitical competition in the Western Balkans.