SABOR RATIFIES SEVERAL INT. PROTOCOLS AND BILATERAL AGREEMENTS

ZAGREB, Sept 26 (Hina) - The Croatian parliament on Wednesday morning ratified several international protocols and bilateral treaties including agreements on the set-up of a southeast European crisis management council and a loan granted by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) to the national oil company INA for environmentally safe projects. Speaking on behalf of the Croatian Party of Rights-Croatian Christian Democratic Union (HSP/HKDU) bench, Tonci Tadic opposed the ratification of the agreement of the crisis management council for southeast Europe saying that only Bulgaria, Slovenia and Macedonia had signed it so far. "In Croatia there has never been nor will there be any volcanic eruption, and we wonder why we need such an agreement and why we are being pushed in a framework which in this case is obviously southeastern," said the member of the right-wing HSP. Tadic suggested that Croatia and its neighbours sign bilateral agreements on the matter instead of the proposed treaty. Ante Simonic of the Croatian Peasants' Party (HSS) bench hailed the ratification of the agreement and stressed that natural disasters most frequently hit "ordinary people" and the country was therefore bound to cooperate with its neighbours in taking preventive measures. The parliament unanimously ratified the agreement on the government's collateral to the loan granted by the EBRD for INA's ecological projects. Most MPs voted for the ratification of the European convention on trans-border television, a protocol on protected areas and biological diversity in the Mediterranean, and treaties on the cooperation of the Croatian government with the UN High Commissioners for Human Rights and Refugees. (hina) ms