"I cannot recall any insulting statement by a Croatian politician about Slovenia or Slovene politicians, which cannot be said about some Slovene parliamentarians whose statements about Croatia's head of state and the prime minister were rather insulting," Grabar Kitarovic said in a comment on a ten-point document the Slovene foreign ministry released on its web site on Wednesday evening. The document urges Croatian politicians and media to change the manner in which they are depicting relations with Slovenia, because it is causing uneasiness in Slovenia that might develop into anti-Croatian sentiment and lead to "inappropriate initiatives".
Minister Grabar Kitarovic said she was very surprised at the document considering the ongoing dialogue between the two countries.
However, it is a fact that there are outstanding issues between Croatia and Slovenia most of which were inherited from the time of the former Yugoslav federation and which need to be resolved, she said.
"Those outstanding issues with Slovenia are indeed our responsibility, they cannot be a subject of talks on membership in the EU, but that does not mean that we want to ignore them or refuse to settle them. It is in the interest of both Slovenia and Croatia to settle those issues as soon as possible".
Grabar Kitarovic said she was particularly surprised at the allegation in the document that Croatia might use the outstanding issues in relations with Slovenia as an excuse for the possible lack of progress in its EU membership talks.
"Quite the contrary, we always say that those are bilateral outstanding issues, that it is our responsibility to resolve them through dialogue, and if that is not possible, to approach an international judicial body and go to arbitration."
The minister dismissed insinuations that Croatia was making unilateral
moves. "We are abiding by the Brijuni declaration on the avoidance of incidents and by other agreements, but we shall protect our national interests."
Grabar Kitarovic went on to say that the document of the Slovene ministry
was unnecessary and that the two countries should continue their dialogue in the spirit of mutual respect and good neighbourly relations.
Although Slovenia says in the document that it is ready for arbitration, Croatia has still not received a response from Slovenia to its proposal to launch arbitration procedure.
"We proposed that state secretaries start talks on the basic procedure, the subject of the procedure, etc. Also, the proposal for arbitration was repeated in a number of notes sent in the meantime to the Slovene side," the minister said.