Bosnian FA adopts new statutes to lift ban
SARAJEVO - The Bosnian Football Association (NFS BiH) adopted new statues on Thursday which should pave the way for the Balkan country to have a FIFA and UEFA ban lifted and continue their Euro 2012 qualifiers.
"After a short and constructive debate, the new statutes were adopted unanimously by 55 of the 56 deputies who attended the session," NFS BiH said on its website.
The Bosnian national team and clubs were suspended from international competition on April 1 after the NFS BiH failed to meet a deadline to reform its three-man ethnic presidency, whose structure contravened FIFA and UEFA standards.
Until now, the NFS BiH presidency members have been named on ethnic rather than professional criteria, which is a daily issue in the country born as an independent nation from the former Yugoslavia's bloody break-up in the 1990s.
A Serb, a Croat and an ethnic Muslim took turns in running the body's rotating presidency and the failure to restructure it gave FIFA and UEFA no choice but to suspend Bosnia from international competition.
FIFA then appointed a six-man normalisation committee, headed by Slovenian Rudi Zavrl, to run the NFS BiH until a single president was elected.
"I would like to thank members of the committee and the NFS BiH deputies for being cooperative and constructive, they've accomplished a huge task and conditions have been created for NFS BiH to resume its work normally," Zavrl told Bosnian media.
Senior Bosnian football official Faruk Hadzibegic added: "This has opened the doors for the suspension to be lifted by the end of the month so we can carry on with our Euro 2012 campaign."
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Bosnia, who are fourth in Group D with seven points from four matches, are due to play away to Romania on June 3 and at home to Albania four days later.
France top the group with 12 points from five matches, followed by Belarus and Albania who each have eight from five.