His task in East Timor, a country which gained independence in 2002, will be to train and advise local police in cooperation with colleagues from foreign countries, Assistant Interior Minister Filip Dragovic said on Tuesday.
Hrlic underwent training for the mission at a UN course for police in Turkey.
Dragovic said the Interior Ministry planned to send several more police officers to attend UN seminars this year and, if necessary, deploy them in similar missions.
The permanent representative of the UN Development Programme Office, Cornelis Klein, expressed satisfaction that the first Croatian police officer was going to the UN mission in East Timor, which he said was one of the world organisation's most successful missions.
Croatian police have so far taken part in Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe missions, for example in Kosovo and Georgia, where one Croatian police is still deployed. Two officers have recently been sent to the NATO mission in Afghanistan.
Reporters were also briefed about the National Border Management Information System project, which the Croatian and French interior ministries are carrying out as part of the CARDS programme. The project, financed by the European Union with EUR2.5 million, was launched a year ago. Its goal is to introduce border management which meets the so-called Schengen criteria. The Pleso and Bajakovo border crossings will be the project's trial locations.