Grabar-Kitarovic said she was expecting the announcement of a pre-accession strategy for Croatia in early October, and that the document would include the amount of pre-accession funds for the country, too.
She also believes that entry negotiations will begin at the start of 2005.
Asked to comment on the Slovene government's announcement that it would withhold its support to Croatia's efforts to enter the EU after a recent border incident, the Croatian minister said she was "unpleasantly surprised by this" as the problem was "a bilateral issue which we (Croatia and Slovenia) must settle as two friendly countries on the basis of mutual respect". If dialogue is not possible, the matter should go to arbitration, she added.