Mesic said this to reporters after visiting Serb returnees in Orlic, near Knin. Mesic visited the returnees together with Serbian President Boris Tadic, who is on a one-day official visit to Croatia.
Serbian President Tadic said he came to the Knin area to work on a project that he and Mesic had launched a long time ago.
"When President Mesic was Serbia, we visited the areas populated by Croats, at the north of Vojvodina, and now we came to Dalatia," Tadic said.
"We came to support Serbs to stay in their homes, as we have supported Croats to stay in their homes," the Serbian president said.
Asked to comment on a statement by Serbian deputy prime minister Ivana Dulic-Markovic who said in Vukovar yesterday that Croats in Serbia had more rights than Serbs in Croatia, Tadic did not answer directly.
"The Serbian deputy prime minister is a Croat, which is a good thing and I would like to see this kind of a reciprocity in the Croatian government, Tadic said, declining to assess her statement in detail.
Mesic and Tadic visited the Serb family Gojko that returned to Croatia ten years ago.
"This visit could help people gain back the faith in themselves and in the two countries' leaders," said a member of the Gojko family who is also the president of the Council of the Serb Minority in Biskupija municipality.
Before visiting Orlic, Mesic and Tadic held talks with Knin mayor Josipa Rimac and Sibenik-Knin County Prefect Duje Stancic.
Tadic said he came with friendly intentions, stressing that "Serbia respects its neighbour Croatia".
"I wanted to come to Croatia, to towns where my people has been living for centuries and see what the situation is like today," Tadic said. He added that this was a historic visit because it gave him an opportunity to visit the place where wounded needed to be healed and where a new future must be built.