"The task force has done a big and hard job and it is furthest from its mind to embellish or exaggerate figures or to play with the negotiations and Croatia's reputation," the chief of the negotiating task force for education, Pero Lucin, told the press.
He estimated that the media allegations, which he labelled as "unreasonable and contrary to national interests," would hurt the negotiations. He added it remained to be seen if the allegations would reflect on the education chapter or the chapters that would be screened in the future.
The media today quoted Gvozden Flego, a member of the education task force and a minister in the previous government, as saying that the science ministry's budget for this year was lower than the 4.4 per cent of GDP stated, or about two billion kuna lower than the figure stated in Brussels.
Flego also claimed that only 3,900 professors were on the ministry's payroll and that there were 45 students to one professor.
Assistant Education Minister for International Cooperation Radovan Fuchs said the European Commission ambassador to Zagreb had been called to the ministry following the media allegations. Fuchs voiced hope there would be no problems with the negotiations.
Lucin said he expected Flego to withdraw from the task force.
According to science ministry data based on Central Bureau of Statistics figures for 2004 and 2005, Croatia has 8,764 higher education teachers. The ministry said that during negotiations the European Union had asked for the number of teachers engaged in teaching and not only the number of university professors. It also underlined that on average, there were 18-20 students to one teacher.
(EUR1 = 7.3 kuna)