Sanader, who gave an interview to the Belgrade-based "Dnevnik" daily on Saturday, said that during his visit to Belgrade last year "we signed several agreements very important for both countries, and we shall continue this cooperation".
"I think that we should solve, first of all, humanitarian issues, the problem of missing persons, the return of people, restitution of property and archives and all other items on the agenda," the Croatian premier said.
Responding to a journalist's claim that all those processes were affected by "burden of the past", Sanader said that "it is a historical fact that Croatia was attacked and that (Croatia) was a victim of the aggression and defended itself, and won that war".
"All of that is now behind us, and we must look at the future, we regard the future as being much more important than great discussions on the past," he added.
"As far as this is in concern, and this is my remark I refer to everybody, we are too much occupied with the past. For instance, protests ensued and people were outraged when Serbia-Montenegro's Foreign Minister Vuk Draskovic and his party proclaimed Draza Mihailovic as an anti-Fascist. We know which crimes his Chetniks perpetrated during (the 1941-1945) war and one can understand those protests. I, however, believe that those topics prevent us from shifting our attention to the future, building the future on the basis of mutual respect and recognition of sovereign states and from showing respect to human and minorities' rights in every of our countries as well as from cooperating in European integration processes," Sanader said.
The future of Croatia and Serbia-Montenegro lies in European integration processes and I am convinced that the sooner Croatia enters the European union, the quicker Serbia will do the same," the Croatian official said.
Historians should deal with the past and the current politics should be oriented towards future. This applies to everybody, including Mr. Draskovic, Sanader said.
He, said among other things, that Croatia has incorporated European values, and now it is only necessary to see a formal confirmation of the country being a part of the European Union.
"One of requirements is cooperation with the Hague tribunal and we know that the problem is the fact that General (Ante) Gotovina is not yet in The Hague, given that there is an indictment against him and he has to appear (before that court). It is important to say that from our point of view, this is not only the issue of the tribunal, but also our internal issue: Croatia has the Constitutional Law on cooperation with the Hague tribunal which stipulates that every indictee must appear before the tribunal. Consequently, this is a matter of the rule of law," Sanader said.
Commenting on the improved economic cooperation between Croatia and other countries in the area of the former Yugoslavia, he said that very important two problems existed, referring to the problem of restitution of many petrol stations and outlets which the Croatian national oil industry INA and clothes' manufacturer 'Varteks' respectively had in Serbia-Montenegro. There are also problems of companies from Serbia-Montenegro asking for their property which they had in Croatia (before the war), It is now on us to solve it, the Croatian premier said.