POZEGA, Dec 7 (Hina) - Croatian President Stjepan Mesic spoke in Pozega Friday night at a ceremony marking the 30th anniversary of the Croatian Spring in Slavonia and Baranja. He said that the ideas of the historical event had for the
most part been achieved through Croatia's independence, and now also Croatia needs a national consensus about "what it can and what it wants". At the celebration held under Mesic's auspices, present were Savka Dabcevic Kucar, Mato Novacic, Igor Dekanic, Srecko Bjelic, Antun Lovric and others who participated in the 1971 national movement. "The Croatian Spring movement gave certain answers to then current questions, which is that we must have clear accounts, be equal with others and that we want a democratic society. This was the answer to the Croatian Spring to the challenges of the time," Mesic said. He assessed that the Croatian national movement at the time could not b
POZEGA, Dec 7 (Hina) - Croatian President Stjepan Mesic spoke in
Pozega Friday night at a ceremony marking the 30th anniversary of
the Croatian Spring in Slavonia and Baranja. He said that the ideas
of the historical event had for the most part been achieved through
Croatia's independence, and now also Croatia needs a national
consensus about "what it can and what it wants".
At the celebration held under Mesic's auspices, present were Savka
Dabcevic Kucar, Mato Novacic, Igor Dekanic, Srecko Bjelic, Antun
Lovric and others who participated in the 1971 national movement.
"The Croatian Spring movement gave certain answers to then current
questions, which is that we must have clear accounts, be equal with
others and that we want a democratic society. This was the answer to
the Croatian Spring to the challenges of the time," Mesic said.
He assessed that the Croatian national movement at the time could
not be entirely successful, mostly because of the international
atmosphere which was not on its side, but despite this, the ideas of
the Croatian Spring were for the most part achieved through
Croatia's independence.
Those who were "breaking" the Croatian Spring could not destroy
everything, so even the Constitution of 1974 included everything
the spring activists had requested, which is for the republics (of
the former Yugoslavia) to be states and have the right to
independence, the president stressed.
The communist official of the time, Savka Dabcevic Kucar also spoke
at the ceremony. She pointed out the necessity of scientific
analyses and an objective judgement of the achievements of the
Croatian Spring movement. It is a multi-dimentional, multi-level
and multi-meaning historical event which has still not been
accurately and completely analysed in the Croatian historical
science, let alone in the circle of European and democratic
aspirations, which, in its finale, brought to the break up of
communist systems in Europe and to Europe's unifying, Kucar
stressed.
(hina) lml sb