ZAGREB, Dec 7 (Hina) - Commenting on the just adopted state budget for 2003 which, among other things, reduced funds for his office, Croatian President Stjepan Mesic said on Saturday that his office getting about a million kuna less
or more was of minor importance as it did not resolve Croatia's problems.
ZAGREB, Dec 7 (Hina) - Commenting on the just adopted state budget
for 2003 which, among other things, reduced funds for his office,
Croatian President Stjepan Mesic said on Saturday that his office
getting about a million kuna less or more was of minor importance as
it did not resolve Croatia's problems. #L#
Mesic said funds were reduced for all budgetary items and,
consequently, for his office as well.
Talking to reporters at his office after meeting citizens, the
President said the budget should not fund every activity and that
many organisations should be financed from members'
contributions.
He added it was necessary to see if the best solution had been found
regarding the financing of political parties.
"It is absolutely clear that we can never have everybody happy with
the budget because the demands are too large and the funds limited,"
Mesic said.
"Croatia certainly has an expensive state mechanism and it is
difficult to please everyone seeking to have their problems
resolved with budgetary funds. It is a pity that we haven't managed
to activate the Croatian economy because we would have had more to
allocate," the President said.
He also commented on the recent testimony of Milan Babic at the
trial against former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic before
the U.N. war crimes tribunal at The Hague. Babic was a leader of the
rebel Serbs' parastate in Croatia in the early 1990s.
Mesic said Babic had turned down the Croatian authorities' attempts
to find a political solution and had urged other Croatian Serb
municipal leaders to do the same.
"That shows how far back the organisation Slobodan Milosevic set up
(in Croatia) dates and where the orders came from," said the
President.
Mesic added that when he had chaired the ex-Yugoslavia's federal
presidency, Babic had headed a delegation of Serbs from Knin at
meetings with Milosevic and Serbia's representative in the
presidency, Bora Jovic, in Belgrade.
Mesic said he had told Babic after one such meeting that Milosevic
and Jovic were deceiving him and that he would get nothing of what
they were promising him in terms of territory in Croatia. Mesic said
Babic had laughed at his suggestion that every problem in Croatia
could be resolved through dialogue.
"In light of his testimony he now probably remembers what I told him
back in 1990," the President said-
(hina) ha