CROATIAN, SLOVENE PREMIERS ON CONTENTIOUS ISSUES

ZAGREB, Jan 17 (Hina)- During the Quadrilateral Summit in Zagreb, Croatia and Slovenia's Prime Minister, Ivica Racan and Anton Rop, met for a brief bilateral meeting, the first since Slovene Premier Rob took office. The two premiers spoke about contentious issues burdening the two countries' relations. #L# "We agreed on policies of gradual steps, namely that issues would be resolved quite rapidly where such thing is possible while those issues that are more important will take some time to think about and to gradually attempt to find a solution," Slovenia's Premier Rop told journalists. The Slovene premier said they discussed the most significant problems and agreed to search for a solution to the nuclear power plant of Krsko (NEK), the ratification of the NEK agreement and to resolve other contentious issues by legislative means. In that regard, Rop stated that it was necessary to ratify the NEK agreement which had been stalled in Slovenia since mid last year. He mentioned that some new elements have been introduced through new directives by the EU and that Slovenia was preparing these measures. In addition to the NEK agreement the most complicated issues are the definition of the border as well the settling of Ljubljana Bank's debts to Croatian clients. The two premiers also spoke about economic co-operation and in that regard they discussed a possible solution to the problem surrounding an offer by a Slovene tourist company to purchase the 'Suncani Hvar' hotel chain, Rop said. At the meeting of the Quadrilateral, Slovenia's premier as well as the premiers of Italy and Hungary fully supported Croatia's accelerated accession to the EU and NATO. (Hina) sp it