ASSOCIATION OF CROATIAN WRITERS HOLDS ANNUAL ASSEMBLY

ZAGREB, June 28 (Hina) - The Association of Croatian Writers (DHK) presented its work in the past year and submitted a financial report at Saturday's annual assembly held in Zagreb. Members discussed the regular publication of the "Republika" and "Most" magazines, as well as the association's library. #L# Hrvoje Hitrec spoke about the very difficult position of freelance artists and their pensions of 850 kuna (EUR113). Writers advocate the pension coefficient returning to its previous 1.2 instead of the current 0.35. Hitrec also spoke about the markedly low fees authors receive for their work, stressing that they got only 2,600 kuna (EUR373) per 16 pages of text. Speaking about owners of publishing companies, Hitrec said they forgot about solidarity with writers, intentionally and impudently cheating them out of their dues in favour of non-writers. Mentioning the Croatian Writers' Society (DHP), which was founded last year after a rift among writers, Hitrec said its members had not succeeded and that they had not left the DHK "because of poetics and aesthetics or genre identification, but because of politicking". He also mentioned, as he put it, the ridiculous idea about scholarships for authors from the culture ministry. Hitrec views the ministry's decision as farcical, saying that way "Croatia would get state writers, as many in the new society are, but this has not been financially confirmed yet". Writer Ante Zemljar again condemned the removal of a memorial plaque from the DHK building. The names of writers who were killed during World War Two were written on the plaque. Participants said poet Vesna Parun was given the association's "Tin Ujevic" award for the best collection of works in 2003, "Suze Putuju". (hina) lml sb