A Croatian newspaper today published an article to that effect, but Roncevic said there had been a misunderstanding and that Croatia had not yet decided about the choice of aircraft.
"A reporter of one of our daily newspapers asked if our pilots had trained on F16 planes within military cooperation with the Americans. They have trained and will attend training, not only with American partners but with all friendly countries, but this does not mean that we have decided on the type of aircraft," Roncevic said in Brussels, where he attended an EU Troika ministerial meeting.
After meeting the foreign ministers, the European Union's defence ministers discussed the development of Europe's security and defence policy. The EU Troika then briefed the defence ministers of accession candidates Croatia, Turkey and Macedonia, as well as Iceland and Norway, which are not EU members but are in NATO.
"The EU Troika informed us of the most current aspects of the European defence policy, the situation in international peace missions and in those crisis spots in the world of special interest to the EU," Roncevic said, adding that he informed his EU counterparts of the course of Croatia's defence reform.
He said Croatia had declared its readiness to send up to 300 troops to EU, NATO or UN peace missions in 2007.