Presenting the bill, Ladislav Pivcevic of the National Security Council said that information of vital interests to the state would be designated as "very secret" and that any unauthorised disclosure of such information would be cause irreparable damage to national security.
This would in particular concern information relating to the values defined in Croatia's constitution, its independence and territorial integrity, international reputation, diplomatic relations, defence capabilities, security and intelligence system, public safety, economic and financial system, and technologies of security and scientific interest to Croatia, he said.
The designation "secret" applies to information whose unauthorised disclosure would cause serious damage to the above-mentioned values, the designation "confidential" applies to information whose disclosure would cause damage to those values, while the designation "restricted" applies to information whose disclosure might cause damage to the interests of state and local government bodies.
Pivcevic said that a bill on security checks would be finalised soon. In this context Prime Minister Ivo Sanader said that before adopting the bill it would be necessary to amend the Decree on Security Checks to avoid a repetition of the Cigelj case, or unauthorised security checks.