Representative Paddy Ashdown with Christian Schwarz-Schilling in late 2006, the latter aimed at promoting "local ownership" and fostering the closure of the Office of the High Representative (OHR), including by finalising constitutional reform talks. Differently than the closed-door approach taken by U.S. diplomacy for the April Package, Schwartz-Schilling aimed to set up a "constitutional convention" to foster public debate and break the monopoly of ethno-nationalist parties. He proposed a law-based constitutional commission, to be nominated by the Bosnian Parliament, with three co-chairs (a Bosnian intellectual and one each from the U.S. and the EU) and a technical secretariat composed equally of Bosnians and internationals. Although Germany was ready to finance it, the proposal was not welcomed by the EU Council (who deemed it too internationally-driven) and by the Commission (who was worried the initiative would complicate the ongoing talks around police reform). The Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ BiH) also soon withdrew its support, and the initiative faded away in the summer of 2007. Feeling a lack of confidence from Brussels, Schwarz-Schilling decided to resign. 2008 Prud Agreement Constitutional reform talks restarted in 2008, after the end of the police reform process (and the ensuing signature of the Stabilisation and Association Process between Bosnia and Herzegovina and the EU) and the municipal elections. On 8 November 2008, the leaders of the three main national parties (Milorad Dodik for the SNSD, Sulejman Tihić for the SDA and Dragan Čović for the HDZ BiH) signed a joint agreement in Prud stating their aim of harmonising the Bosnian Constitution with the European Convention on Human Rights, to clarify state competences and establish functional institutions, and to reorganise the middle layers of governance, including settling the legal status of Brčko. The Prud statement also explicitly called for amendments to be drafted with the expert assistance of international institutions. Despite monthly meetings of party leaders, the "Prud Agreement" did not lead to a compromise on territorial reorganisation, as Tihić and Čović saw the talks as a way to abolish the entities with four non-ethnic regions, while Dodik aimed to entrench the right of Republika Srpska to secede after a three-year period. Dodik also started to further challenge the OHR and call for the repatriation of competences to the entities, relying on the growing support of Russia. The only concrete result, upon U.S. pressure, was the agreement to amend the Bosnian Constitution to incorporate Brčko District under