NEW YORK, Jan 19 (Hina) - Croatia's parliament president, Vladimir Seks, and Foreign Minister Miomir Zuzul, who arrived in the United States last Saturday at the invitation of the U.S. Congress, will try to strengthen relations
between Zagreb and Washington.
NEW YORK, Jan 19 (Hina) - Croatia's parliament president, Vladimir
Seks, and Foreign Minister Miomir Zuzul, who arrived in the United
States last Saturday at the invitation of the U.S. Congress, will try
to strengthen relations between Zagreb and Washington.#L#
On Tuesday, Seks and Zuzul will attend a formal session of both houses
of Congress at which the U.S. President will give a
state-of-the-nation address.
On Sunday the two Croatian officials attended Mass in the Croatian
church of St. Cyril and Metod in New York and after that they met
members of the American Croatian community in that city.
During their first official visit to the United States since their
recent appointment as the Sabor head and Foreign Minister, Seks and
Zuzul will hold talks with several U.S. congressmen and senators.
Addressing Croatian reporters in New York on Sunday, Zuzul said he
was going to discuss with his American hosts the promotion of
bilateral relations and the U.S. support to Croatia on its road
towards NATO.
"We shall ask Congress to offer support to Croatia so that it could
soon be admitted to NATO as a full member, and this will be our basic
approach," the minister said adding that he believed that Zageb could
count on the backing.
He went on to say that the new government in Croatia would like to
strengthen the relations with the United States, keeping in mind
Croatia's interests.
Asked to comment on the U.S. media's assessments that the Ivo Sanader
Cabinet is a pro-American government, Zuzul said that they were a
"pro-Croatian government which starts from the interests of the
Croatian people, Croatian nationals and State". He, however, added
that the new government had a different position towards the United
States in comparison to the position of the previous Croatian
government.
"We believe that it is really in interest of the Croatian State and
all citizens to have good and firm relations with the United States,"
the Croatian Foreign Minister said.
He added that the new government did not prefer the United States to
the European Union or vica versa. It was wrong to say that Ivo Sanader
and the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) leadership opted for America.
There is no dilemma, Zuzul said adding that "Croatia wants to enter
the European Union and NATO and have firm and friendly relations with
America".
Concerning some contentious issues in the relations such as Zagreb's
position on the war in Iraq and an agreement on the non-extradition of
U.S. nationals to the International Criminal Court, Zuzul sad the
talks with U.S. officials would revolve around all the issues, but
this was primarily a parliamentary visit and main topics would be the
promotion of the ties between the Sabor and Congress.
Seks and Zuzul described the invitation of Congress as the honour and
credit to the new Croatian parliament and the Croatian state, too.
The parliament's head said he was pleased that "the new course of the
Croatian policy has been given this credit".
Addressing the American Croats, Seks said that the new government
would work on the restoration of what he called frozen ties between
Croatia and the diaspora, and would invest more efforts in creating
political and legal prerequisites for Croatian emigrants' investments
in the economy of their motherland and for the application of their
abilities and know-how.
(Hina) ms