Reiterating that her country has to respect and promote minority rights as one of the preconditions on the path toward the European Union, Croatia's Foreign Affairs and European Integration Minister Kolinda Grabar Kitarovic said Croatia had a respectable framework for the protection of those rights.
This year, the Croatian government has earmarked four million euros from budgetary funds for minorities, which was 30 percent more that in 2005, she added.
"The current Government is determined to enforce laws regulating minority rights, and this is also a part of the government's foreign policy in southeastern Europe," Minister Grabar Kitarovic said, adding that Zagreb had signed bilateral agreements with Serbia-Montenegro and Bosnia-Herzegovina on the protection of respective minorities
"The respect for minority rights is one of the indicators of the maturity of a democracy, given that minorities are not a problem, but a wealth of a country," Grabar Kitarovic said.
The chairman of the EU Council of Regions RELEX commission, Reger Kaliff, said that it was very important for countries aspiring to EU membership to help their ethnic minorities to exercise their rights.
He voiced hope that Croatia would continue making progress on the road towards the EU.
A member of the European Commission's delegation, Alfonso Peeters, commended Croatia for its Constitutional Law regulating minorities' rights.
Peeters said he was aware that such a law could not be applied overnight and that additional laws were necessary.
He added that it was questionable why ethnic minorities representatives were not deployed in the police and the judicial system in the country.
The chairman of the Croatian parliamentary Human and Ethic Rights Committee, Furio Radin, said minorities supported the Ivo Sanader cabinet which he said positively treated their rights.