PANEL - CROATIA CAN AVOID BEING TIED TO REGION BY ADAPTING TO EU

ZAGREB, May 2 (Hina) - Croatia can avoid being tied to the region if it steps up adapting to European standards, bearing in mind that for the time being the European Union does not have a final strategy for countries in Southeast Europe participating in the stabilisation and association process, an official said. "It is of vital importance for Croatia to use its objectively bigger potential, including in the economy, than other countries so as to prevent any possible notion of an institutionalisation of regional cooperation," Mate Granic, chairman of parliament's European Integration Committee, said on Wednesday. He was speaking at a panel called "Croatia on the Eve of Signing a Stabilisation and Association Agreement (SAA)" at the Europe House in Zagreb. Granic, a former foreign minister, applauded Croatia's efforts to have the SAA's political introduction stress the application of an individual criterion in the joining of the EU and regional cooperation as a network of bilateral agreements, and not a multilateral model. Croatia and the EU should hold a final negotiating round on the SAA in Zagreb on May 10 or 11, making initialling possible in Brussels on the 14th. Croatia must adapt and act as though it already were a member of the EU, regardless of when formal membership will come into force, said Mladen Stanicic, director of the Institute for International Relations. The government estimates the Croatian society should be ready for full-right membership by the end of 2006. (hina) ha sb