FM says Croatia wants to calm tensions with Serbia

Croatia wants to normalise the situation with Serbia and calm tensions after ICTY indictee Vojislav Seselj set Croatia's flag on fire in Belgrade and after Serbian minister Aleksandar Vulin criticised Croatian Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic, Croatian First Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign and European Affairs Minister Vesna Pusic said after the government session on Thursday.

Asked about Croatia's further steps towards Serbia, Pusic said she hoped calming tensions would be the next step, adding that a marginal phenomenon from the past such as war crimes indictee Seselj was not important now, but that relations between Croatia and Serbia were important.

The Croatian Foreign and European Affairs Ministry on Wednesday sent a protest note to the Serbian Charge a'Affaires in Croatia, Bosa Prodanovic, and Croatian Ambassador to Serbia Gordan Markotic has been summoned to Zagreb for consultations, following an incident which Seselj caused earlier in the day by setting a Croatian flag on fire outside the Hall of Justice in Belgrade.

"Relations between Croatia and Serbia are in the focus of our attention and those relations represent the economic, political and security future. This is our job, our responsibility and this is what we will do," Pusic said.

Pusic said that Croatia had primarily reacted to statements made by a member of the Serbian government, Labour Minister Aleksandar Vulin, about Croatia, General Ante Gotovina, and Prime Minister Milanovic, adding that summoning the Croatian ambassador for consultations was a message that such rhetoric was truly damaging to relations in the region and relations between the two countries.

Yesterday's statement by Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic indicates that Serbia too believes that tensions should be calmed, Pusic said, adding that in her opinion, Serbia too wanted to normalise relations with Croatia. We understand to a point the situation they have found themselves in with the Seselj case, but regardless of that, we all have responsibility towards the region and life in the region, Pusic said.

Serbian PM Vucic said on Wednesday that the incident caused by Seselj sent a bad message about Serbia and he called for calming tensions, adding that he would talk on the phone with Croatian PM Milanovic so that they could call on members of their governments to act reasonably.

Serbian minister Vulin yesterday called on Milanovic to "refrain from speaking against Serbia" and rather "get over his vanity", visit Belgrade and speak his mind about Serbian people and Serbia.

"Come to Serbia and meet the 250,000 people expelled during Operation Storm," Vulin told reporters in Jabuka near Belgrade, asking Milanovic "to tell the Serbs expelled from Croatia that they did not leave Croatia for economic reasons" but had to run before "former ICTY indictee Ante Gotovina" whom Milanovic considers an "angel."

He clearly wanted to send a negative message which disrupts our relations and which is a practice that must stop once and for all, and our reaction is going in that direction, Pusic said.

She underscored that not a single Croatian official would ever use such rhetoric in connection with any country, let alone a neighbouring country.

(Hina) its

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