Bosnian Serbs marked on Tuesday their self-proclaimed "national day", disregarding condemnations and warnings that the holiday violated Bosnia's constitution and put peace at risk.
The January 9 anniversary observes Bosnian Serbs 1992 declaration of their own republic in Bosnia, just three months before the outbreak of the war that claimed 100,000 lives.
"If we forget what Republika Srpska (RS) means, we will also disappear," pensioner Mara Radjen told AFP in the RS administrative centre of Banja Luka. "We know why our fighters died, why blood was shed, and we must mark that, in the name of God and all Serbs."
Celebrations were held although the "holiday" was deemed anti-constitutional by both Bosnia's central government and the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
In a speech late Monday RS President Milorad Dodik stressed that the "goal of a Serbian people is a Serbian state in these areas.
"The RS exists to guarantee freedom to the Serbian people."
Dodik told AFP in an interview on Monday: "We simply have the right to mark the day we consider to be our day."
Dodik has been threatening his entity's secession ever since he started to dominate Bosnian Serb politics in 2006.
Since the 1992-1995 war, Bosnia and Herzegovina has been split along ethnic lines into two semi-independent entities.
There is the mostly-Orthodox Christian Serbs' Republika Srpska and the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, made up of mostly-Muslim Bosniaks and mostly-Catholic Croats.
During the war Bosnian Serb soldiers were led by Ratko Mladic.
The latter was along Bosnian Serb wartime political leader Radovan Karadzic sentenced to life in prison by a UN war crimes court, notably for the 1995 Srebrenica massacre of some 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men.
- 'Peaceful separation' -
The two Bosnian halves are linked by weak central institutions.
Nearly a third of Bosnia's 3.5 million people live in Republika Srpska, whose territory makes up nearly half the Balkan country.
Dodik was among the 83 ethnic Serb lawmakers who decided to create Republika Srpska.
The 64-year-old has little regard for the decisions taken by Bosnia's central institutions and does not recognise the authority of the country's constitutional court.
In recent months, he announced that RS was on course to organise its own elections and take over state property on its territory.
He also said that Bosnia is moving towards a "peaceful separation".
"We are mentally integrated with Serbia. Of course, we are part of Bosnia now, but that's because we have to be," he told AFP.
Dodik claimed to have no doubts that Bosnian Serbs want independence, but due to "still fresh memories of the war" are hesitant to make the move.
"We must celebrate (January 9) to know when and how Republika Srpska was founded", said war veteran Oliver Milakovic.
"Perhaps one day the time will come for it to be independent."
Dodik's secession threats, anti-central state rhetoric, insults to the top international envoy and the US ambassador to Bosnia -- as well as his closeness to Russian President Vladimir Putin -- have made him the Western governments' bete noire.
But Dodik, who is under US and British sanctions, said he was "proud" to be able to regularly meet the Russian president whom he labels a "great leader".
On last year's "Day of Republika Srpska" Dodik decorated Putin with his entity's highest medal of honour. This year he awarded the same medal to Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orban this year.
Dodik is also a close ally of Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic who sent him a congratulatory message for the "holiday" on Monday.