Speaking at a news conference, Culture Minister Bozo Biskupic said that experts were working to protect some important areas in the country, such as islands, as well as the north-western Zagorje region. Apart from the island of Lastovo, the Neretva River should be given the status of a nature park, he added.
The minister said that Croatia would host an inter-governmental conference on biological diversity in Europe, to be held in Plitvice Lakes National Park on 22-24 February.
The conference will be attended by representatives of the European Union, the United Nations, Croatian PM Ivo Sanader, and delegations from 54 countries-signatories to the Pan-European Biological and Landscape Diversity Strategy, Biskupic said, adding that the conference was part of preparations for the 8th meeting of parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, to be held in Brazil in March.
The Convention on Wetlands was adopted on 2 February 1971 in Ramsar, Iran. The list of wetlands of international significance contains 1,562 locations on 134 million hectares of land, including four from Croatia - the Neretva River delta, the bird reserve Crna Mlaka and the nature parks "Lonjsko polje" and "Kopacki rit".
Croatia signed the Convention in 1991.