PAKRAC AND USAID SIGN MEMORANDUM OF UNDERSTANDING

PAKRAC, April 6 (Hina) - USAID Director for Croatia William Jeffers and Mayor of Pakrac Davor Huska on Tuesday signed a memorandum of understanding under which the US agency would provide financial support by 2007 for the development of the business sector and local government in this town, about 120km east of Zagreb.#L# The USAID has up to now invested about 2 million in the town in the construction of a day care centre, a town market, a students' dormitory, a power transmission network and a street lighting system as well as in mine clearance. Jeffers said at the signing ceremony that Pakrac was a community that had overcome the traumas of war and that all people, regardless of their ethnic background, were involved in building the town's future. Huska said that the funds would be used for the promotion of small and medium-sized businesses and that the town had prepared several programmes which would be assessed by USAID before their implementation. Jeffers said that the United States had invested 386 million supporting various programmes in Croatia, of which 260 million through the USAID. (Hina) vm