The meeting focused on cases which last more than five years.
The court presidents voiced concern about the fact that the number of new cases was growing by the year and that 2004 had seen 1,461,858 new cases, or 12 percent more than in 2003. The number of cases that were solved last year was 1,393,724 or 16.84 percent more than in 2003. Despite this increase, the number of backlog cases continued to grow due to an influx of new cases.
Courts in Zagreb and Split have the largest number of unsolved cases, the reason being their complexity and lack of judges, Crnic said.
Justice Minister Vesna Skare Ozbolt, who attended the meeting, told reporters that the ministry would pay for the additional work of courts, judges and judicial advisors in dealing with backlog cases.
If the current pace in dealing with backlog cases is kept, courts could solve all backlog cases in a year and a half, Skare-Ozbolt said.