"I an happy to say that Croatian PEP has been positively assessed and structural reforms which Croatia is carrying out have also been positively assessed," Suker told Croatian reporters in Brussels after he attended a meeting of finance and economy ministers from candidate countries and European Union member-states.
According to the joint conclusions from this meeting called a ministerial dialogue, Croatia's economy has lately been growing at a steadier and faster pace with a low inflation rate and stable currency rate. The fiscal consolidation is under way. However, the foreign debt remains to be solved, particularly the problem of a high share of the foreign debt in the Gross Domestic Product.
With regard to this issue, the government has reduced the foreign debt by eight percent or 600 million euros over the two years, Suker said adding that the the growth of the foreign debt "has been considerably decelerated".
The Croatian minister also said that he expected that in 2007 Croatia would draw substantial amounts from the EU pre-accession funds, notably for the reform of public administration and the environment protection.
The Brussels meeting gathered finance ministers of the two acceding countries, Romania and Bulgaria, and three candidate countries, Croatia, Turkey and Macedonia, who met with their colleagues from EU member states.
The practice of such kind of dialogues was launched in 2001.
Croatia now took part in the ministerial dialogue for the first time.