MPs adopted a law on the agency for the supervision of financial services and a new law on foreign currency transactions.
Deputies ratified a loan agreement with the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development for the financing of the social care system, a project worth EUR45.6 million. The bank's loan amounts to EUR31 million, the Swedish Agency for International Development will secure EUR1.6 million, while the Croatian government committed itself to securing EUR14 million over the next five years.
The majority of MPs adopted a new law on special terms of putting flour on the market. Also adopted was a new law on state subsidies adjusted to European Union standards, as well as a new law on forests, under which the Croatian Forests company will be transformed from a public company into an enterprise which will have to operate by market principles and become competitive on the domestic and foreign markets.
MPs also adopted amendments to the law on wages for authorised state auditors.
They unanimously adopted a decision to proclaim 2006 Nikola Tesla Year.
Voting on a new law on courts and amendments to the law on the State Judicial Council was postponed for next week due to the dissatisfaction of ethnic minority deputies with the government's refusal of an amendment on the proportionate representation of minorities among judges.
The amendment was moved by the parliamentary committee on minorities' rights referring to the constitutional law on ethnic minorities.
The government turned it down. A state secretary at the Justice Ministry, Snjezana Bagic, explained that the amendment clashed with Croatia's international commitments because Croatia was due to invite bids for judges' positions regardless of candidates' ethnicity.
Serb deputy Milorad Pupovac urged the government to eliminate the difficulties which prevented people from declaring themselves as members of an ethnic minority instead of saying that it was impossible to implement the constitutional law.
The chairman of the parliamentary committee on minorities' rights, Furio Radin, said the constitutional law on ethnic minorities was above technical issues.
Speaker Vladimir Seks postponed the vote until the government took a position on the demands of the ethnic minority deputies.
Parliament added another dozen items to the current session's agenda, including a draft national budget for 2006, with projections for the 2007 and 2008 budgets, and a bill on the execution of next year's budget.
Parliament will not be in session tomorrow because of the marking of the 14th anniversary of the Vukovar tragedy and will reconvene on Tuesday.