"I do not know what it is about, as we are still waiting for the full information, but I would like to treat it in an easy-going manner," Sanader said on Friday when reporters asked him about the case of Ambassador Tomislav Vidosevic who has not yet presented his credentials to the Italian authorities.
Sanader, who was at a reception ethnic Serb representatives gave in Zagreb on the occasion of Christmas which Serb Orthodox faithful celebrate according to the Julian calendar, i.e. on 7 January, recalled that less than four months remained before the elections in Italy and that the election campaign was an internal matter of the country.
He, however, stressed that the Osimo and Rome accords which the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia had signed with Italy "are beyond any doubt and will not be changed".
Croatia, as a successor to the former Yugoslavia, also took over commitments stemming from the agreements which now regulate the Croatian-Italian bilateral relations.
On Thursday, two Croatian dailies speculated about reasons for the procrastinations in the accreditation of the new Croatian ambassador to Italy.
Later in the day, the Italian Ambassador to Croatia, Alessandro Grafini, denied having ever discussed with a state secretary at the Croatian Foreign Ministry, Hido Biscevic, the appointment of Tomislav Vidosevic Croatia's Ambassador to Rome, adding that the delayed presentation of Vidosevic's credentials to Italian President Carlo Azeglio Ciampi had to do with internal assessments on Italy's part, some of which were of organisational nature.
"As regards claims made in today's issue of Jutarnji List daily ... notably its highlighted section reading 'Italians insulted by a diplomat with such a poor biography', I want to deny that I and Hido Biscevic, a state secretary at the Foreign Ministry, ever talked about the appointment of Vidosevic Ambassador to Rome, and I never expressed my view on the matter in any way," Grafini said in the statement on Thursday, adding that the Italian Embassy had excellent relations with Vidosevic at the time when he was assistant foreign minister in charge of multilateral relations.