ITALIAN OFFICIAL PRESENTS PROJECT OF TRANSBORDER EURO-REGION IN RIJEKA

RIJEKA, Feb 17 (Hina) - The president of the Italian autonomous region of Friuli Venezia Giulia, Riccardo Illy, and his associates met Primorje-Gorski Kotar County prefect Zlatko Komadina in Rijeka on Tuesday to present the project of a transborder Euro-region, the Alps-Adriatic.#L# The project would cover the border regions of Italy, Croatia, Slovenia and Austria. The regions would cooperate in the economic, cultural, social and other fields, thus partially removing the obstacles which will emerge following Slovenia's admission to the EU, i.e. the introduction of the so-called Schengen border regime, Illy said. He also advocated the signing of a bilateral agreement on labour exchange between Italy and Croatia and stressed the need for building roads linking Trieste with the Slovene border, Zagreb and Ljubljana, and Maribor and the Hungarian border. Prefect Zlatko Komadina stressed the need for building a highway linking Italy and Croatia via Slovenia, stating that Italy had already built its part of the highway to the Slovene border and that Croatia would soon complete its segment of the road. Komadina also stressed the need for cooperation between northern Adriatic ports which, he said, with their geo-strategic position could compete on the European market. He also welcomed Illy's project of the transborder Euro-region. (Hina) rml sb