Proposed Croat federal unit in Bosnia and Herzegovina

It possessed its own institutions and state administration, including armed forces (the Croatian Defence Council), a president, prime minister, and legislative assembly.

During the Bosnian War, international mediators and envoys proposed several peace plans that included forming three federal units in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

In 1992, EC diplomat José Cutileiro sketched a proposal in which he stated that the three constituent units would be "based on national principles and taking into account economic, geographic, and other criteria".

On 20 August, the UN mediators, Thorvald Stoltenberg and David Owen, unveiled a map that would organise Bosnia and Herzegovina into three ethnic mini-states.

The 1995 Dayton Agreement that ended the war left the country divided into two political entities, the Serb-dominated and controlled Republika Srpska and the Bosniak-Croat Federation.

Namely, after 2002 each nation's deputies to the House of Peoples are elected by 10 Cantonal assemblies, the majority of which (6) is controlled by Bosniak politicians.

[7] After Bosnian Croat politician Božo Ljubić filed an appeal, in December 2016 the Constitutional Court found the election system of the deputies in the House of Peoples unconstitutional and abrogated the controversial rules.

[18] In addition to that, two minorities' representatives appealed to the European Court of Human Rights since they cannot run for state presidency due to their ethnic background (being neither of the three constitutive nations) and won the case.

EU asked Bosnia and Herzegovina to implement the ruling, named Sejdić-Finci, which would require changing electoral laws and perhaps the constitution.

The largest town with Croat majority, Mostar, with a sizeable Bosniak minority, has been in a gridlock since 2008 since the two communities cannot agree on the electoral rules for local elections.

Bosnia Herzegovina 2001: the international community versus the Bosnian Croats Office of the High Representative: Chronology/Monthly Tracker 2001 In 2000, the Office of the High Representative in the country imposed amendments to the Federation's constitution and its electoral law, which complicated its structure and impaired the parity between Bosniaks and Croats that had been in force.

He claimed the two-entity system is untenable and that Croats have been subject to assimilation and deprived of basic rights in the federation with the Bosniaks.

He proposed assigning same powers that Republika Srpska currently holds to new Croat and Bosniak entities, possibly changing borders of municipalities to better reflect ethnic composition and turning Jajce into a Croat-Bosniak district, like Brčko today.

"[29] David B. Kanin, an adjunct professor of international relations at Johns Hopkins University and a former senior intelligence analyst for the CIA, pointed out in February 2017 that Bosniak politicians' unilateral policy "justifies the Croats' demand for their own entity.

"[30] Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina in its landmark Decision on the constituency of peoples ruled that: Territorial delimitation [of Entities] must not serve as an instrument of ethnic segregation – on the contrary – it must accommodate ethnic groups by preserving linguistic pluralism and peace in order to contribute to the integration of the state and society as such [...] Constitutional principle of collective equality of constituent peoples, arising out of designation of Bosniaks, Croats and Serbs as constituent peoples, prohibits any special privileges for one or two constituent peoples, any domination in governmental structures and any ethnic homogenization by segregation based on territorial separation [...] [D]espite the territorial division of BiH by establishment of two Entities, this territorial division cannot serve as a constitutional legitimacy for ethnic domination, national homogenization or the right to maintain results of ethnic cleansing [...] Designation of Bosniaks, Croats and Serbs as constituent peoples in the Preamble of the Constitution of BiH must be understood as an all-inclusive principle of the Constitution of BiH to which the Entities must fully adhere...[31]It is unclear what territory Croat federal unit would encompass.

The International Crisis Group pointed out that the vestiges of Croat territorial autonomy in the Federation exist in the form of the area Archived 25 March 2017 at the Wayback Machine served by the electricity utility Elektroprivreda HZ HB, "which covers most areas of Croat habitation",[36] Croatian Post Mostar, HT Mostar etc.

[37] As far as the Herzeg-Bosnia's tentative territory, Karamatić proposed the area served by the electricity utility Elektroprivreda HZ HB.

[38] In February 2017, Croatian-language newspaper in Bosnia, Večernji list, published a proposal for a Croat entity that would include all of the Croat-majority or plurality municipalities (24 in total).