COE SECRETARY GENERAL SUPPORTS CROATIA'S JOINING EU

ZAGREB, March 3 (Hina) - The Council of Europe Secretary-General, Walter Schwimmer, on Monday supported Croatia's attempts to join the European Union and expressed hope this would take place as early as the next round of the enlargement, in 2007. #L# At a meeting with a Croatian parliament delegation in the Council of Europe's Parliamentary Assembly, Schwimmer expressed hope Croatia would be among the countries to join the European Union in the next round. He said he hoped that membership of the Council of Europe, which Croatia joined in 1996, would assist the country's accelerated joining the EU. The CoE secretary-general advocated better pan-European cooperation on an equal basis, regardless of the size of individual countries and the fact whether a country is in or out the EU. He said that after another 10 countries joined the EU, half the European countries would be in the Union, so an idea on a EU associated membership of the Council of Europe is being contemplated. The whip of Croatia's strongest opposition party, the Croatian Democratic Union, Vladimir Seks, and the vice president of the Croatian Social Liberal Party (HSLS) bench, Dorica Nikolic, complained to Schwimmer that their parties were not represented in the Croatian parliamentary delegation to the CoE Parliamentary Assembly. The head of the Croatian delegation, Mirjana Feric-Vac of the Social Democrats, said the reason for that were last year's rifts within the two parties. (hina) it sb