Mesic, who will attend a conference of Southeast European countries in Karadjordjevo near Belgrade on Monday, met the president of the Croat National Council, Josip Pekanovic, and the leader of the Democratic Alliance of Vojvodina Croats, Petar Kuntic.
"We want the Croatian-Serbian agreement on the mutual protection of minorities to be implemented entirely, because it will help achieve what has already been achieved in Croatia - European standards in the protection of ethnic minorities," Mesic said after meeting local Croat officials in Backa Palanka.
Mesic said that his hosts described current inter-ethnic relations in Serbia as "relaxed" in relation to the time of the Slobodan Milosevic regime.
"A lot has been done to build institutions of the Croat community, but a lot remains to be done because assimilation has significantly affected the Croat community," Mesic said.
He said that he believed that an ethnic minority must have a parent nation and that if this standard was respected in Vojvodina and Serbia, Croatia would consider the bilateral agreement on the mutual protection of minorities entirely implemented.
Local Croat representative Josip Pekanovic said that the position of the Croat minority had generally improved, that anti-Croat incidents had subsided and that some rights had been acquired, but that they were not sufficient.
"We expect to be given certain political rights. This primarily refers to direct representation in the Serbian parliament," Pekanovic said.
On Monday President Mesic will attend a conference of Southeast European heads of state, dedicated to the fight against organised crime and terrorism. He is expected to meet Serbian President Boris Tadic on the margins of the conference to discuss the status of the Croat minority in Vojvodina.