- Published: 02.12.2017.
Croatian PM to travel to Mostar next week to calm Bosnian Croats following ICTY verdict
Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic said on Friday evening he would travel to Mostar next week in order to calm Bosnian Croats worried by possible consequences of the ICTY guilty verdict against their former military and political leaders.
"We have agreed to go to Mostar early next week, meet the Croat leaders and veterans, calm them and extend messages of Croatia's strong support,"PM Plenkovic told a news conference he held with Bosnian Croat leader Dragan Covic.
He reiterated he was dissatisfied with parts of the judgment "referring to incomplete and wrongfully established facts and certain political connotations speaking about the role of the then Croatian leadership".
Apart from his visit to Mostar, PM Plenkovic also announced President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic would take part in the next UN Security Council session dedicated to the work of the war crimes tribunal at The Hague. He said Grabar-Kitarovic would "clearly articulate Croatia's position about the judgement."
Covic said Croats in Bosnia were following with concern recent developments in The Hague. "We want to stand behind every honorable member of the Croatian Defence Council and encourage those people not to allow themselves to be provoked," said Covicwho is also the presiding member of the Bosnian collective Presidency.
He said Bosnian Croat leaders "will know how to respond to this by political means" and seek solutions for Bosnia and equality for the Bosnian Croat people.
"I call on our partners both Bosniaks and Serbs to work together on these processes...to normalise relations in Bosnia and Herzegovina as soon as possible. Notably in the communication between the Croat and the Bosniak people...because this verdict primarily refers to 1993," Covic said.
The Appeals Chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia found on Wednesday, as part of the ruling against six Bosnian Croat officials, that there existed an international armed conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina as well as a state of occupation, and confirmed the existence of a Croatian joint criminal enterprise aimed at ethnically cleansing parts of BiH.
It was the tribunal's final session. The confirmation rulings against the six Bosnian Croats brought an end to more than 20 years of work by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY). Following the pronouncement of the judgement, one of the defendants drank poison in the courtroom and died later in hospital.
Text:Hina