ZAGREB, Sept 28 (Hina) - The Croatian Bloc - Movement for Modern Croatia on Saturday welcomed the unity which the Croatian parliament demonstrated on Friday by supporting the initiating of a legal dispute with the Hague tribunal, but
also stated that last night's Croatian Television broadcast on the 1996 parliamentary debate on the adoption of the constitutional law on cooperation with the tribunal brought into question that unity.
ZAGREB, Sept 28 (Hina) - The Croatian Bloc - Movement for Modern
Croatia on Saturday welcomed the unity which the Croatian
parliament demonstrated on Friday by supporting the initiating of a
legal dispute with the Hague tribunal, but also stated that last
night's Croatian Television broadcast on the 1996 parliamentary
debate on the adoption of the constitutional law on cooperation
with the tribunal brought into question that unity. #L#
In a statement headlined "Lack of Unity Could Open the Door to the
Hague Prosecution" the party states that last night "Croatia's
politics for the first time since January 3, 2000 ceased simply
complying with the Prosecution's and Tribunal's requests".
The Croatian Bloc considers as "particularly positive" "the
achieved degree of unity and the refusal to instrumentalise the
case for party purposes", and calls for the preservation of that
unity.
The party was disappointed to see that on the same night "the state
television... broadcast a special programme on statements and
positions on April 18, 1996, at the time when the constitutional law
on cooperation with the Hague tribunal was adopted".
The Croatian Bloc believes that the lack of harmony between the
state authorities' efforts to create an atmosphere of unity and the
simplified journalistic approach of the state television
"seriously brings into question our ability and sincere wish to
try, with a single stand, to make Croatia's position as favourable
as possible".
The party deplores "broadcasts which turn the Hague case into a
party electoral video, suggesting that only the incumbent premier
had moral and legal doubts regarding the tribunal's credibility,
and distorting at the same time the meaning of statements by some
representatives at the time".
The Croatian Bloc strongly supports Ivic Pasalic's statement at the
time that the Croatian parliament would "know how to change and, if
necessary, annul" the constitutional law, "should it lead to
motives other than the stabilisation of the situation, the
prosecution of criminals and the establishment of justice and the
truth..."
(hina) rml